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NEGLECTED VIEW OF EDUCATION.
•
Jirtart
DELIVERED AT
Mr. M. D. CONWAY’S CHAPEL, CAMDEN TOWN,
NOVEMBER 21st, 1875,
By
M. MACFIE.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
1 II THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD,
LONDON, S.E.
1876.
Price Fourpence.
�TO THE READER.
The following Lecture is published by the desire
of many who heard it delivered.
As it aims at a practical rather than a controversial
object, it has been thought that the friends of Educa
tion might wish to promote its distribution.
In case you should decide to circulate it among
your friends, the publisher is willing to make a
deduction of twenty-five per cent, when quantities are
ordered.
�NEGLECTED VIEW OE EDUCATION.
--------- ♦---------
HE subject of education, like some other and
greater questions debated by our law-makers,
has two aspects—a political and a philosophical aspect.
The first of these has to do simply with the right
of the tax payers, in claiming certain concessions from
Parliament for the intellectual and moral good of the
population. The latter of these aspects, concerns the
far-reaching social issues of the educational measure.
And the result of our agitation of this question will
be at least unsatisfactory, unless the political boon
we seek is understood in its philosophical bearings.
But it is to be feared, that many who are fighting in
the van as well as in the rear of the movement for
national education, and who have a clear enough
comprehension of the subject politically, are still far
from realizing its application philosophically. The
struggle of the dominant Church to keep the con
trol of the people’s education in its own hands, for
sectarian purposes, has compelled the friends of the
National Education League to narrow their discussion
of the question, in and out of the legislature, to one
point. In order to carry the enemy’s barriers, they
have been forced to concentrate their efforts mainly
upon obtaining a just Education Act, and an impartial
working of that Act in school districts. It has been
found so necessary for the Liberal party, till recently,
to limit their exertions to checking the tendency of the
Government to apply the revenue of the country to
the teaching of the dogmas of conflicting sects, that
our views of what education is in its full and broad
T
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A Neglected View of Education.
acceptation, may have been obscured in the dust
and din of the contest. We have had to work so
hard in placing education, as supplied at the national
expense, on a purely secular basis—the only basis on
which we can equitably take our stand in requiring
the appropriation of Treasury or local funds, for
the education of the children of the masses,—that we
have been apt to lose sight of many other aspects
of the matter, if possible, much more momentous.
The rank and file of education orators, on the
platform, in the pulpit, and in the senate, would
have us believe that, if we can but put children
through the process of learning to read, write, and
cypher, and give them some smattering of history,
literature, and science, with perhaps, an appreciable
theological tincture mingled—vice, pauperism, and
crime, the inhumanities and dishonesties festering in
commerce, brutal excesses, and parental ignorance,
would die out, and give place to a millennium. Nor
is it wonderful that such sanguine though vague ex
pectations should be indulged. It would be ungrate
ful and wrong to doubt that sound school and college
instruction, universally diffused, would be a great
step towards such a consummation. We may congra
tulate ourselves, that a beginning has been made—as
it must be made somewhere—in the elevation of our
countrymen, even though for the present the move
ment is not, and does not aim at, all some of us could
wish. If we might compare the child to the bee,.
elementary education gives the wings by which it is to
fly from flower to flower in the bowers of knowledge,
and extract the honey of truth. Primary school train
ing supplies the tools, without which the youth cannot
cut his way to a noble self-development. But we
must not forget that the highest culture we can get
from books and seminaries of learning, goes no further
than putting these tools in our hands. Oar use of
them comes later; and the fact which so commonly
�A Neglected View of Education.
$
escapes notice, even in the best informed communities,
is, that it is not the man who has acquired stores of
varied knowledge and experience of the arts that is
educated; but he, and only he, who employs these
things in rounding off his whole being and character
—filling up the gaps, and paring down the over
growths. Education proper, the adjustment, dis
cipline and proportionate development of our physical,
intellectual, and moral nature only begins, if it take
place at all, after we leave school; and if the
result of classes, tutors, study, and thought, in what
ever direction—be not to mould, refine, balance,
and strengthen, every part of us, as the exigencies of
our organisation may require,—our education is almost
an empty name, though we may leave our alma mater
with “ blushing honours thick upon us.” This, though
the most vital view of the question is the one, I ven
ture to assert, least enforced in our families and Edu
cational Institutions, whether primary or advanced,
whether secular or religious. And hence the mon
strous illusion in which multitudes of all classes grow
up, that if they have only gained fair proficiency
in the recognised branches of instruction, have
passed examinations creditably, have learned to use
language with grace and perspicacity, and to feel
at home in the proprieties of fashionable society, or
have mastered the details of their profession, they are
educated. And the mischiefs bred by this shallow and
pitiable conceit are past reckoning. We are not
educated—in any adequate sense—unless our training
leave in the mind a sacred deposit of principles, clear,
and independently thought out; unless those principles
settle down into cherished and practical convictions,
and unless those convictions prove their reality in the
correct management of our health, the honest, fear
less, and unbiassed use of our reason, yielding us the
courage of our opinions, and the earnest culture of all
beautiful, tender, unselfish, and brave sentiments;—
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A Neglected View of Education.
unless our appetites, passions, and desires, are dulymoderated in a manner befitting our relation to our
selves, to the laws of the universe, and to humanity.
The person who comes nearest to this ideal is alone
entitled to be called a highly-educated man. The one
who falls most bel-ow this standard—be he ever so
quick-witted diligent in intellectual, or even in
certain moral or religious pursuits, is the least edu
cated. . I grant that an intelligent rake is more
interesting and tolerable than an ignorant and vulgar
one, that it is less offensive to be swindled by a clever
and agreeable knave, than by one who is gross as
well as mean and tricky ; that selfishness is not so
odious in one of graceful manners and generous speech,
and whose ambition soars to intellectual and social
honours, as in one in whom this vice is reckless and
undisguised. But what we want to feel more deeply
and to teach more frequently, is that the commonly
received opinion as to the nature and ends of human
training is pernicious to society, and offers a formid
able hindrance to the real progress of mankind. If
the chief object of rational existence were simply to
multiply adepts in scholarship, mechanics, military
tactics, agriculture, or commerce, and to perpetuate
races of lop-sided minds with one or two faculties
disciplined, and the rest left unheeded, presenting
intellectual and moral malformations—then the ruling
ideas of education might continue to be indulged, but
if the grand aim of life should be to discipline each
power that it may fulfil to the utmost its appropriate
functions, within lawful limits, and in subjection to
the laws of truth and harmony, then the time has
arrived for reform in our conceptions and methods of
culture.
There are three conditions possible for human
beings in respect to education. There are indivi
duals whose nature is like a garden, so walled-up and
over-hung with dense vapours, that the sun cannot
�A Neglected View of Education.
7
penetrate ; their minds are covered with the weeds of
folly and the rubbish of superstition, and grow only
what is rank and unwholesome. There are others
whose nature is like a garden, in which the plants
in one plot get little care and hardly any sun, while
those in another section have plenty of both. There is
another class, not the most numerous, however, whose
nature is like a garden well cultivated, the flowers and
fruits springing up in genial soil presenting a southern
aspect—not an inch of ground hid from the fostering
light, and air, and warmth. A moment’s reflection
will, doubtless, recal to you instances of these
several types of mind and character. Those utterly
shut out from the light of knowledge, and growing
up in moral wastes, are to be found chiefly, but not
exclusively, in the lower strata of society—in the
abodes of squalor, improvidence and ignorance. Na
tures in the second condition, I have pictured, half in
the light and half in the shade, form the majority,
and may be met with in all ranks, from the highest to
the lowest. But it must be confessed that it is rare
to find persons in any sphere of life, of whom it can
be said that they come up to the terms of the third
condition, and have faithfully striven to make the
most of themselves in all respects. Perhaps it is most
common to meet with those who answer to the homely
metaphor of the Prophet: “ Ephraim is like a cake
not turned”—baked—almost burned on one side and
raw on the other; with some parts of their organisa
tion excessively developed and the rest dwarfed ; no
obligation being solemnly and intelligently felt by
them to till and keep the whole ground. To regard
the elements that are popularly understood to consti
tute the most liberal training of a lady or a gentleman
as exhaustive of what the education of a mind ought
to be, is to profane this most sacred of all subjects,
and encourage a painful error. Who has not
known or read of men that have mastered the most
�8
A Neglected View of Education.
subtle problems of life, and distinguished themselves
by profound insight into the workings of the human
mind, that have allowed other regions in their nature
to remain conspicuously uncultivated. There is no
more striking illustration of this contrariety of men
tal tendencies than Lord Bacon. But for the unde
niable testimony of history, it would appear incredible
that the author of the ‘Counsels, Civil and Moral,’
and of the immortal treatise, ‘ The Novum Organon,’
could be guilty of such execrable baseness towards
his benefactor, Essex, and that the same man should
write ‘ The Advancement of Learning,’ and lend
himself, as Attorney-General, to a crafty and bigoted
King, to foment the persecution of Roman Catholic
priests, and justify the Protestant burning of heretics ;
file informations against those who gave utterance to
free opinions, and degrade himself to the uttermost
by sharing complicity with the King in hushing up a
royal crime in relation to Somerset too disgusting to
specify. To judge the natures, as a whole, of some
eminent authors within living memory by what they
wrote, and wrote so beautifully, one would fancy that
no lives could be purer, no dispositions more lovely,
no hearts more responsive to appeals of suffering
and want, no consciences more delicately strung than
theirs ; and yet in some cases—happily not in all—
when we come to know their inner life, we have
found them almost the reverse of all this. Their
memories were enriched with the choicest symbols
of everything noble and good, and their imagina
tions ran wild with ideal luxuriance, while those
faculties and powers that were not among the forces
that produced their literary reputation, were sometimes
left a prey to weakness and neglect. There is no
rule without its exceptions ; but as a rule it may be
said, so little has the ideal of education now under
our consideration been acted upon, that the very fact
that a man is singularly strong in one direction, may
�9
A Neglected View of Education.
be taken as an index that he is singularly weak in
another. If he have severely trained the logical
faculty, he is almost sure to have slighted the culti
vation of common sense, or that delicate sensibility
which a chastened and refined imagination promotes.
If he be distinguished by a susceptible emotional na
ture, and devoted to moralism or philanthropy, he
will probably not be found remarkably vigorous in
tellectually ; and how often it has happened that men
who have attained high distinction in a profession
requiring very great mental acuteness, have left
themselves specially open to attack in their appetites
or passions.
I have heard from those competent to express an
opinion, that so often have they been disappointed by
marked contradictions—not necessarily grave moral
inconsistencies—in distinguished political, and even
in religious, leaders, that their early enthusiasm in
seeking the private acquaintance of such persons had
received a considerable check. I have been told that
in proportion as men’s lives are consecrated to sup
porting a public relation, or a relation purely to the
public, their capacity for the cultivation of intense,
constant, and self-sacrificing private friendship seems
to diminish. If carried away by their public function,
those sentiments which befit the attitude they con
stantly sustain to the public are so stimulated, that
without special watchfulness, the feelings and bear
ing belonging to the quiet devotion of a private
relationship are apt to decay. I have heard of an
instance of this sort, in which consciousness of apti
tude to sway the masses on political and social
questions has led to these results. In public the
man’s enunciation of great and liberal principles was
so fervent and kindling to the sympathies of his vast
audiences, that the poorest person might be tempted
to approach him under the impression that his manner
would be warm and attractive, while, as a matter
B
�io
A Neglected View of Education.
of fact, in private he was found to be haughty,
cold, reserved, and repellent, and his ambition to be
great as a public character seemed to eat away those
delicate, genial, unaffected private virtues which alone
make a man beloved and sought after by his friends.
To so sad an extent have I known this discrepancy
between strong public sentiments and weak private
ones to extend, that a certain person who once
lavished many thousands of pounds upon public
charities, knowingly left respectable and deserving
relations on the brink of want. In like manner
are people apt to be imposed upon by the fiction
that, because a man is solely occupied with preaching
high moral and religious truths, he is necessarily
among the best exemplars of his own teaching. But
through neglect of educating the whole man, the
most eloquent in preaching may be the most indif
ferent in practice.
There is another class that may be adduced, as a
warning example of this same perverted view of
education. I refer to a considerable number of
languid youths of both sexes who are supposed largely
to inhabit the “ West-end ” in the season, whose
leisure hangs heavily on their hands, and who, for
want of useful occupation, receive as a god-send the
announcement of the last three-volumed novel to trans
port them for some hours to an elysium of fancy—a
mischievous substitute for the stern realities of the
work-a-day life. My remarks refer not to the use but
the abuse of novel-reading ; and I am only concerned
at present in showing the evil effects of its abuse in
freezing up sympathy with actual distress, while the
vacant-minded reader is being dissolved in tears over
the imaginary scenes of sorrow depicted by the
novelist. That excessive novel-reading may quicken
sympathy and strengthen sensibility of the morbid
sentimental kind is true ; but it is also true that it at
the same time tends to weaken practical benevolence
�A Neglected View of Education.
11
and may end in quenching it altogether. Sentimen
talism of any kind is always whimsical and visionary
unless it be under the direction of judgment and
reason, which always pre-supposes the harmonious
culture of all the faculties and susceptibilities of our
nature. “ There is a law of our mental mechanism
pointed out by Bishop Butler that from our very
faculty of habits, passive impressions by being repeated
grow weaker, and practical habits are formed and
strengthened by repeated acts. Benevolence is
worthless which does not proceed to action. But the
frequent repetition of that species of emotion which
fiction stimulates tends to prevent practical benevo
lence, because it is out of proportion to correspond
ing action ; it is like that frequent going over of
virtue in our own minds, which, as Butler says, so
far from being auxiliary to it may be obstructive of
it. As long as the balance is maintained between the
stimulus given to imagination with the consequent
emotions on the one hand, and our practical habits
which those emotions are chiefly designed to form
and strengthen on the other, so long the stimulus of
the imagination will not stand in the way of benevo
lence but aid it. And therefore if we will read a
novel extra, now and then, about some unfortunate
hero or heroine, we ought to impose upon ourselves
the corrective of an extra ten-pound note to some
poor unfortunate family, who only want substantial
help to enable them permanently to help themselves.
To maintain a balance between the emotions and the
will, and thus give effect to true educational principles,
we should keep a sort of debtor and creditor account
of sentimental indulgence and practical benevo
lence.”*
Another common instance of defective education, in
the broad sense, is the devotee of religious excitement
The ‘ Greyson Letters,’ p. 177.
�12
A Neglected View of Education.
whose religion, in effect,, becomes a bar to enlightened
morality. The religious or devotional faculty in some
people is forced like a hot-house plant into unnatural
growth, and comes out in the rankest forms of
fanaticism. Their brains become suffused and sodden
with the fantastic drapery and musical spells of Highchurchism or with unctuous Evangelicalism. They act
on the Sunday as if the only things worth living for
were singing hymns and offering extatic prayers or
listening to revivalist extravagancies. Yet contact
with many of that class in every-day life proves that
the sentimental sanctities of their church have no
more influence in aiding the development in them of
homely human virtues than the study of poetry
would have in improving the ability of an engineer
to construct machinery; the culture of honour and
justice in their business, of wise and amiable tempers
in their families, and of usefulness to their fellow
citizens, hardly costs them a thought. Jacob is not
the only person who took undue advantage of a
brother, and then lost himself in dreams of a ladder
reaching up to heaven, with angels going up and
down upon it. How often do we find that individuals
of the intensely devotional type have zeal without
tenderness, energy without repose, care for what
they deem truth, without charity towards those whom
they account heretical, driving by this incongruous
compound of good and evil many honest seeking souls
into scepticism and despair.
Perhaps even we advanced rationalists are not
without our special temptations to overlook, in some
respects, the manifold bearings of a whole-minded
culture. We have fought our way, point by point,
out of the Egyptian bondage of miserable dogmas
into intellectual light and freedom, and may we not
sometimes be in danger of resting in the peace and
satisfaction of an intellectual victory, and omit the
minute application of the exalted principles we have
�A Neglected View of Education.
13
attained to the shaping and governing of all the con
stituent parts of our nature ? While orthodoxy may
combine with intellectual feebleness does it neces
sarily follow that theological liberalism is always
associated with moral courage, scrupulous conscien
tiousness and self-denying kindness ? Nothing is more
remarkable in the higher Greek schools than the
practical’turn given to the philosophy taught. Plato,
Socrates, and others were not mere theorists. “ Know
thyself” expressed the condition of entrance upon
studies of the Academy. Their attainments in
philosophy were first applied in making themselves
and their disciples morally better, and still the per
fection of an educated manhood consists in the highest
and freest possible intellectual inquiry combined with
a correspondingly exact application of the know
ledge gained to all the faculties and powers in their
various grades and relations.
A great diplomatist is said to have defined language
as the art of concealing thought, and certainly one of
the anomalies of our civilization is that we sometimes
call things that are very absurd by very fine names.
Thus we honour with the name of education a very
crude and imperfectly-developed state of mind and
character; and, in saying as much, I use not hyper
bole ; I mean no play upon words. Education is
educement, development—harmonious development—
and the thoroughly-educated man is not the scholar or
even the gentleman, commonly so-called, but he who
has the most fully and harmoniously-developed powers
of mind and the most fully and harmoniously-deve
loped powers of body; and the time will come when
the existing fallacy, almost universally practised, if
not taught, on this subject will be looked back upon as
a relic of a rudimentary and transition state of human
culture; when training will formally and positively aim
at securing physical, intellectual, and moral balance;
when predominating tendencies will be harnessed
�14
A Neglected View of Education.
and guided; when the man naturally inclined to
animalism will be systematically brought under the
counter forces of reason and conscience; when the
man of hard logic will be carefully brought into
sympathy with the cause of human weal and trained
in the sentiments of pure and unselfish social affec
tions, in the tender experiences of sweet family
life, and in the refinements of natural and artistic
beauty; when the man of weak moral purpose will
snatch a fair share of the time he now excessively
gives to trade, social ambitions, or the duties of some
profession, to the building up of the waste places of
his mind, and cease the error of thinking his moral
defects inevitable, or imagining that his virtues can
in any degree pass as an atonement for his imper
fections.
Having dwelt on the meaning of true education as
distinguished from false, allow me for a moment or
two to try to show how this art of educating the whole
nature may be successfully carried out. The three
grand essentials of an efficient education are the best
teachers,. the most suitable text-books, and the strictest
application of what we learn, to the elevation of physical,
intellectual, and moral life. If one of this trinity of
requisites be wanting, the business of educating is
spoilt, and our time and money as good as wasted.
The development of the mind is just as much under
the direction of law as the growth of the plant. It
is sad to read the Report of Official School Inspectors,
and to see how very few out of the millions of children
in our schools indicate even a superficial acquaintance
with the subjects they profess. Of course, there will
always be differences of attainment owing to different
degrees of talent and application. But if only justice
were done to the three essentials I have named, no
child of average ability couid miss getting a compe
tent idea of the branches he was taught, or fail to
realise their bearing on the culture of his mind.
�A Neglected View of Education.
i$
There are teachers here and there thoroughly en
lightened, able, and consecrated, having a worthy
and comprehensive idea of their work, but they are
not numerous, and this is not to be wondered at.
For owing to the wretched feudalists cant, out of
which the nation is now but slowly passing, a school
master used to be looked down upon as belonging to
a fifth-rate social position; and, consequently, till
lately, only fifth-rate men could be induced to become
candidates for the office. It was only self-denying
devotion to the work, or dire pecuniary necessity,
that formerly induced persons to take up the profes
sion of a teacher ; and it was not likely that a crop
of efficient teachers could be raised under conditions
so chilling. Public opinion is still a long way from
offering encouragements that would tempt men of
philosophical understanding and culture into this
greatest of all human offices. Why is it that the sons
of our noblemen, squires, and even of our merchants
are mostly drafted to the bar or into the church or into
commerce, and that we hardly hear of youths belong
ing to these classes becoming working schoolmasters ?
*
Why would so many parents rather that their sons
earned a mere pittance in any of the professions than
get a fair living as a schoolmaster ? The post of a
schoolmaster has not been deemed respectable enough.
It will be very different by-and-bye, when English
men and English women have cast that fictitious god
of so-called respectability to the moles and the bats
and risen to the purer sphere, in which the truly
highest realities will be duly appreciated, and the
really highest functions adequately honoured and
remunerated. The day will come when the training
of youth in scientific and philosophical principles will
* Of course the Head-mastership of our great and ancient endowed
schools are not referred to here. The honoursand emoluments of such
positions have never been deemed, amongst us, incompatible with the
highest talent, scholarship, and even family influence.
�16
A Neglected View of Education.
be viewed in so exalted a light that the most power
ful and cultured minds of both sexes in the kingdom
will, gladly enlist in this service, and when the pro
fession of a teacher will rank, as it deserves to do,
the noblest and most honourable of all.
But the use of the best text-books is equally indis
pensable. In this respect, too, matters are improving,
but we have still a good deal to learn, and not till the
nation rises to a full realisation of the nature of the
work to be done can we be expected to have text
books that will fitly correspond with the end we have
in view.
I speak it with sorrow, but with grave delibera
tion, in the language of an eloquent writer —
*
“ the rock upon which all our hopes of rescuing the
mass of our countrymen from ignorance and bar
barism, are in danger of being dashed, consists in the
unreasoning and indiscriminate veneration in which
the Bible is popularly held among us as a central
educational book. Impelled by that veneration, we
hesitate not—I refer to Englishmen generally,—to
degrade our children’s view of Deity by familiarising
them with a literature in which He is represented as
feeble, treacherous, implacable, and unjust; and con
found at once their intelligence and moral sense, by
compelling them to regard that literature as altogether
divine and infallible. This notion is ingrained by
priestcraft in the minds of the multitude and even of
their Parliamentary representatives, that morality,
•—except when based upon the contents of the Bible,
—is not only defective but mischievous. And yet it
cannot be too distinctly asserted—if we sincerely
desire our children to have an education really con
sisting in the development of intelligence and con
science,—that it is absolutely impossible to give from
the Bible instructions in the principles of morality
• Mr. Edward Maitland.
�A Neglected View of Education.
17
and religion suitable to children. There is an absolute
and irreconcilable antagonism between what is called
Biblical theology and correct principles of religion
and morality. Bearing in mind the fundamental fact
in human nature, that man’s view of Deity inevitably
reacts upon himself, tending to form him in the image
of his own ideal—it is evident that to familiarise
children with the imperfect morality, the coarse
manners and expressions, the rude fables, and the
unworthy conceptions of Deity, appertaining to a
people low in culture—such as were the Israelites—
and to confound their minds and consciences at the
most impressible period of life, by telling them that
such narratives and representations are all divinely
inspired and infallibly true—is to utterly stultify
ourselves and the whole of the principles by which
we profess to be actuated in giving them an educa
tion at all. Did we find any others than our
selves, any South Sea savages for example, putting
into the hands of their children, books containing
coarse and impure stories, detailing the morbid
anatomy of the most execrable vices, extolling deeds
prompted by a spirit of the lowest selfishness, exult
ing in fraud, rapine, and murder, and justifying what
ever is most disgraceful to humanity, by representing
it as prompted or approved by their Deity, and so
making Him altogether such a one as themselves—
surely we should say that they must be savages of the
lowest and most degraded type, and sad proofs of the
utter depravity of human nature. Palpable to the
eyes of all are the hideous tales of Lot and his
daughters; Judah and Tamar; the massacre of
Shechemites; the Levite of Ephraim; David and
Bathsheba ; Amnon and his sister, and whole chapters
of Leviticus and the Prophets. That such things
should be in a book freely given to children to read,
and that they should be expected, notwithstanding, to
grow up pure and uncontaminated in mind and habit,
�18
A Neglected View of Education.
is one of those anomalies in the British character
which makes it a hopeless puzzle to the world. Who
can say that much of the viciousness at present pre
valent among us is not attributable to early curiosity
being aroused and stimulated by the obscenities of
the Old Testament.”
And if we turn from the Old Testament to the New,
mingled with the unquestionably precious gems of
moral teaching, we have hopeless contradictions in
the narratives and precepts of the Gospels, and false
and degrading doctrines in the epistles, which may
safely be credited with a vast amount of prevailing
intellectual confusion, sectarian fanaticism, and low
morality. Teachers should be required both by
School Boards and parents, to hold back the know
ledge of the Bible from the pupils till their latest
stage of training, and when the objectionable portions
are taught, the pupils should be made to understand
that these represent only the imperfect notions of a
semi-barbarous age and people, and as having no
special claim upon their reverence. And the passages
of the Bible that harmonise with natural morality,
should be presented as the outcome—not of any super
natural revelation—but of the ordinary moral instincts
of higher humanity.
We want the rising generation to cultivate freely
the art of thinking for themselves, to sift out the
precious from the vile in their investigation of truth,
to be always certain that the premises they reason
from are based on provable facts, and to draw their
conclusions logically from these premises; and not from
sentiment or passive submission to traditional or con
ventional authority, to be blinded or awed into the
surrender of their individual judgments ; and books
on history, science, art, and the philosophy of morals,
having a tendency to develope eorrect and indepen
dent thought, should from the first be put in their
hands. We want them to be of delicate, pure, and
�A Neglected View of Education.
19
elevated feeling, and the right method of disciplining
this part of their nature is nowhere better set forth
than in that admirable book by Charles Bray, on
the ‘Education of the Feelings.’ We want their
imaginations to be filled with images of unsullied
beauty, and the most vigilant care should be taken
that a selection should be made of works of poetry
and fiction, pre-eminently Shakspeare and Goethe,
free from all maudlin and spurious ideas of life and
duty.
We want their memories to be strong, and choice
passages of intellectual and moral value should be
stored early verbatim in their minds, the full force of
which will be interpreted in the progress of their ex
perience. We want their powers of observation to
be acute, and nothing is better adapted for this pur
pose than a thorough acquaintance with the prominent
facts in the history of ancient and modern nations,
the classifications of objects in geography, botany,
geology, chemistry, and astronomy. We want their
control of their physical functions, their appetites and
passions to be strict and intelligent, and a knowledge of
physiology and the laws of health should be judiciously
instilled. When this view of education has taken
the place of the narrow and insipid trifling to which
education has been subordinated by fashion and sec
tarianism, in this and other countries ; when we have
learned to view the claims of education, in short, not
in relation to sect, creed, and social station, but in
relation to the natural requirements of the mind and
the life of humanity, our class-books, like our teachers,
will be wonderfully in advance of anything ever pre
viously known. Unfortunately the illusion usually
held out to youth as the prime incentive to diligence
in culture is the qualification, which education is sup
posed to give for money-getting and social distinction.
But, with a heightening standard of life in its objects
�20
A Neglected View of Education.
and aims erected in our schools and our families, this
degrading fallacy, too, must eventually disappear.
*
So much, then, is clear. The best teachers will
not avail without suitable methods. But the last
requisite is by no means the least important, viz., the
rigid practice of what is learnt theoretically. A
glaring defect here sadly impairs our success, espe
cially as regards the moral training of the people.
The seed must not only be good and must not only
be sown in prepared soil; it must also be dug about
and helped forward in its growth by the varied
practical experience of what is taught. This is
not wholly overlooked in some of the branches of
intellectual education. It is only the practice of
reading and writing that can test our knowledge
of the rules of grammar. It is only the working
out of numerical and geometrical problems that can
prove our mastery of arithmetic and geometry. The
measure of our acquaintance with the laws of musical
harmony can be best ascertained by exercise on
some musical instrument. How, then, can we hope
for children to become thoroughly trained in morals
unless opportunities are sysZema&caZZy afforded them
for the practice of the principles and laws of virtue ?
This is not the view acted upon by orthodox churches.
I was lately thrown into the company of a self-made
religious man—a type of a large class—who depre
cated the higher quality of secular education now
sought to be given to the children of the masses. He
believed that its result would be to make them dis
satisfied with their position in life, and tempt them
into dishonest schemes, in order to raise themselves
in the social scale; and as for their moral improve
ment, he held that that could alone be attained by
what he termed “ the grace of God.” I told him that
♦Nothing'could be more true and seasonable than the remarks of
Lord Derby on this point in his Rectoral address before the Edinburgh
University.
�A Neglected View of Education.
21
was a phrase I could not understand, and one which
belonged to a bygone age of ignorance and supersti
tion, at which he expressed himself “ sorry for me.”
The old Evangelical notion was—and it is not yet
extinct—that at conversion the soul receives some
mystic essence from Heaven that transmutes its whole
texture supernaturally, so that a new nature is im
parted, which involuntarily manifests itself in suc
cessful aspirations after an almost perfect moral life,
just as an acid and a carbonate combined dissolve and
effervesce in water and change the taste of the liquid.
But, in point of fact, is this radical transformation by
“ grace ” ever seen in daily life ? Having had special
opportunities of studying the interior life of the
religious world for a quarter of a century, I
solemnly declare that I have never once seen the
alleged moral transformation answering to the
theory. Look narrowly into the lives of the vast
majority confirmed by bishops, or admitted to par
take of “ the Lord’s Supper ” in Nonconformist com
munions as “ children of God ” and “ heirs of grace,”
and say if those, as a rule, who profess to be “ saved ”
and “sanctified” by “grace,” are the characters that,
as a whole, approach the noblest moral ideals. While
churches multiply and increase, are justice and truth
and honour and self-denying generosity among their
adherents increasing ? Are there fewer instances of
vexation among employers or of eye-service among
the employed ? Nearly all those who serve in our
families have passed through Sunday-schools, and in
many cases are “ communicants.” Are they, as a
class, becoming more faithful in their duties, more
truthful in their speech, and more honest in their
conduct ? The doctrine of “ sanctifying grace ”
has more frequently than not proved a barrier to
the growth of simple, unaffected natural virtues. So
lulled are many religious minds into delusion by
the imagined power of grace, that ordinary and
�22
A Neglected View of Education,
sound morality is despised by church members as a
product of “ the flesh.” And the effect of this deadly
error upon multitudes of orthodox teachers who
believe it, is to make them feel it to be almost a pre
sumption to try to implant virtue in the child’s mind
by rule and system, while they believe that there is a
mass of inherited depravity in every soul which can
only be overcome by some mysterious and irresistible
inworking of “ the third Person of the Trinity ” in
the mind.
In the school system of the future there will be
scientific arrangements for the discipline of the powers
and dispositions of the children. As a basis of ope
rations, the predominating tendencies of the child’s
mind will be duly ascertained by indices, craniological
and physiognomical, his more marked inherited idiosyncracies will be carefully inquired about and kept
in vie wat all times by the teacher, for his guidance
in dealing with the child’s faculties, and the training
will be adapted accordingly. The unsympathetic
selfishly-disposed child will have special circumstances
planned for his special benefit and adapted to his
moral wants. He will be guided to study the lives
of the unselfish and morally heroic, and, in company
with his teacher, he will be brought in contact with
scenes of misfortune, want, pain, and sickness, at
intervals, for protracted periods—scenes from which
he would tend constitutionally to recoil—that his
spirit may become habitually penetrated by the
sympathy which such spectacles are calculated to
inspire. The same child will have selected for him
the companionship of the most refined, sensitive, and
disinterested of his school-fellows; and such a train
of influence, shaped and brought to bear upon his
weak points continuously, could not fail to greatly
modify the outcome of his natural tendencies. So
will each moral imperfection be dealt with, with
all the care with which a surgeon watches and
�A Neglected View of Education.
23
operates upon a wound, till it be healed. The hard
headed youth, in whom the imaginative element is
defective, will be specially exercised in the power of
discriminating the merits of aesthetic compositions,
—varied forms of beauty in pictures, statuary, music,
and healthy works of fiction, in addition to the pabu
lum supplied for the proper training of his stronger
faculties. The pupil who may have inherited defi
cient sentiments of honour, truthfulness, and justice,
will be suddenly and from time to time placed by his
masters in circumstances calculated to thrust habi
tually, yet tenderly, but prominently, his moral
defects upon his attention, till a sense of shame and
disgust at his faults will induce in time efforts to
subdue them. And so with the subjugation of all
other innate crooked propensities.
In spite of the abuse of the system of penance and
confession in the Roman Catholic Church, which we
are bound to deprecate, there is, nevertheless, at the
root of that corrupt system a principle which might,
under the direction of a sound philosophy of educa
tion, be employed with advantage in general training.
The extreme of morbid and microscopic analysis of
moral faults is doubtless bad; but the opposite ex
treme of leaving the moral culture of the rising gene
ration, as at present, to the vague inculcation of
maxims and precepts, is equally to be avoided. The
dispositions of each pupil’s mind should be mapped
out, and each weakness minutely particularised and
dealt with in detail. Under such a well-defined
method, who can tell the transcendant improvement
that, in half a century, might be worked in civilised
nations !
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET, HAYMARKET.
�
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Victorian Blogging
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An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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A neglected view of education.
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Macfie, Matthew
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 23 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: A lecture delivered at Mr. M. D. Conway's Chapel, Camden Town, November 21st, 1875. Includes bibliographical references. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by C.W. Reynell, Little Pulteney Street, London.
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Thomas Scott
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1876
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CT172
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Education
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (A neglected view of education.), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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Text
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English
Conway Tracts
Education
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Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
Publisher
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
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Title
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An address to the people of Cambridge from the School Committee concerning a recent case of corporal punishment in the Allston Grammar School
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Cambridge (Mass) School Committee
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass.
Collation: 24 p. ; 23 cm.
Notes: Mr Henry W. Muzzey presented the report. Published by order of the Board. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
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Press of John Wilson and Son
Date
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1866
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G5182
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Education
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (An address to the people of Cambridge from the School Committee concerning a recent case of corporal punishment in the Allston Grammar School), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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English
Conway Tracts
Corporal Punishment
Education
School Discipline
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��ALPHABET OF THE DEAF AND DUMB.
a
b
c
d
e
��THE
FIFTY.SECOND ANNUAL EEPORT
OF THE
Directors and Officers
OF THE
AMERICAN ASYLUM
AT HARTFORD,
FOR THE
EDUCATION AND INSTRUCTION
OF THE
DEAF AND DUMB.
PRESENTED TO THE ASYLUM, MAY 16,' 1868.
HARTFORD, CONN.:
WILEY, WATERMAN & EATON, STEAM BOOK AND JOB PRINTERS,
1868.
��PBESIDE1TT.
Hon. CALVIN DAY.
VICE-PRESIDE JSTT^.
JAMES B. HOSMER,
HENRY A. PERKINS,
BARZILLAI HUDSON,
SAMUEL S. WARD,
CHARLES GOODWIN,
ROLAND MATHER,
JOHN BEACH,
NATHANIEL SHIPMAN.
DIRECTORS.
(By Election.)
LEONARD CHURCH,
ERASTUS COLLINS,
LUCIUS BARBOUR,
JONATHAN B. BUNCE,
GEO. M. BARTHOLOMEW,
OLCOTT ALLEN,
JOHN C. PARSONS,
ROWLAND SWIFT,
PINCKNEY W. ELLSWORTH,
FRANCIS B. COOLEY.
EX-OFFICIO.
His Excellency, JOSHUA L. CHAMBERLAIN, Governor of Maine.
Hon. F. M. DREW, Secretaiy of State.
His Excellency, WALTER HARRIMAN, Governor of New Hampshire.
Hon. JOHN D. LYMAN, Secretary of State.
His Excellency, JOHN B. PAGE, Governor of Vermont.
Hon. GEORGE NICHOLS, Secretary of State.
His Excellency, ALEXANDER H. BULLOCK, Governor of Massachusetts.
Hon. OLIVER WARNER, Secretary of State.
His Excellency, AMBROSE E. BURNSIDE, Governor of Rhode Island.
Hon. JOHN R. BARTLETT, Secretary of State.
His Excellency, JAMES E, ENGLISH, Governor of Connecticut.
Hon. LEVERETT E. PEASE, Secretary of State.
SECRETARY.
JOHN C. PARSONS.
TREASURER.
ROLAND MATHER.
��©Sow an4 Teaslws
PRINCIPAL.
Rev. COLLINS STONE, M. A.
INSTRUCTOR OF THE GALLAUDET SCIENTIFIC SCHOOL.
JOHN C. BULL, M. A.
INSTRUCTORS.
DAVID E. BARTLETT, M. A.
JOHN R. KEEP, M. A.
RICHARD S. STORRS, M.. A.
EDWARD C. STONE, M. A.
JOB WILLIAMS, M. A.
ABEL S. CLARK, B. A.
WILSON WELTON.
WILLIAM H. WEEKS.
MARY A. MANN.
SARAH W. STORRS.
CATHARINE BLAUVELT.
TEACHER OF DRAWING.
Miss LOUISE STONE.
ATTENDING PHYSICIAN.
E. K. HUNT, M. D.
STEWARD.
HENRY KENNEDY.
ASSISTANT STEWARD.
SALMON CROSSETT.
MATRON.
Mrs. PHEBE C. WHITE.
ASSISTANT MATRONS.
Mrs. REBECCA A. CADY.
Miss NANCY DILLINGHAM.
RUEUS LEWIS, Master
of the
Cabinet Shop.
WILLIAM B. FLAGG, Master of
the
Shoe Shop.
Miss MARGARET GREENLAW, Mistress
of the
Tailors’ Shop.
��REPORT OF THE DIRECTORS.
To the Patrons and Friends of the American Asylum.
Since the Asylum has entered on the second half century of
its existence, we have been frequently called to deplore the death
of some of its earliest friends. But seldom has any loss been
so marked and irreparable as that which we have suffered by
the death of our late President, Hon. William W. Ellsworth,
in January, 1868. His election to the office was not a tribute
simply to his abilities, his honored name, his political and judi
cial positions, his ripe age or his moral worth, though all these
claims he had to our reverence and esteem.
But he had been, from its inception, a warm and devoted
friend of the Asylum. He was its first Secretary. He was
then a Director. Retiring from the Board under the pressure of
professional and political life, he was again brought into official
relations with the Institution, while for four years Governor of
this State., When in 1862, the office of President was vacated
by the death of Judge Williams, it seemed naturally and fitly to
devolve upon Judge Ellsworth. His associates in this body will
not soon forget with what dignity, conscientiousness, and earn
estness, he discharged his duties as President. A copy of the
resolutions on the occasion of Judge Ellsworth’s death, passed
at an informal meeting of the Directors, is appended to this
Report
At the annual meeting of this Corporation in 1867, its by
laws were so amended as to constitute the Governors and Secre
taries of all the New England States ex-officio members of the
2
�10
Board of Directors. The doubt then expressed, whether non
resident Directors would find it practicable to attend our meet
ings, has been confirmed. But, these gentlemen have generally
manifested by letter, or in personal interviews with the Princi
pal and pupils, or by visits at the Asylum, such a warm inter
est in its welfare, as greatly to gratify and encourage the officers,
instructors and pupils of the institution.
No special or extraordinary action on the part of the Board
has been required since our last Report All the departments
of supervision and instruction have been satisfactorily filled', and
the accompanying Reports show the results of patient labor in a
year of unusual prosperity.
To the Report of the Treasurer, should be added the fact that
the Asylum is still deprived of any income from its Phoenix
Bank stock. We regret that no settlement of the questions in
dispute has yet been reached, but think we may reasonably an
ticipate an adjustment at an early day.
In behalf of the Directors,
JOHN C. PARSONS, Clerk
Hartford, May 9th, 1868.
�RESOLUTIONS.
At an informal meeting of the Directors of the American
Asylum at Hartford, for the Education and Instruction of the
Deaf and Dumb, held at their office on the 18th day of January,
A. D. 1868, James B. Hosmer, Esq., Senior Vice President in
the chair,
THE FOLLOWING RESOLUTIONS WERE ADOPTED.
God in his Providence having removed by death the Hon.
William W. Ellsworth, the President of this Society, and one
of the original corporators, of the Asylum,
Resolved, That as members of this Board, we are called upon
in his decease, to mourn the loss of one of the earliest and most
efficient friends of the important charity committed to our care;
one whose intelligent interest, active labors, .and wise counsels
have contributed largely to the career of usefulness and benefi
cence with which the Institution, during fifty years of its his
tory has been crowned.
Resolved, That we desire to place on record our profound ap
preciation, derived from long and intimate association with the
deceased, of his eminent ability, his spotless integrity, his sound
judgment, his warm sympathies, his genial Christian courtesy,
and of the rare purity, simplicity and nobleness which adorned
his character, and shone forth in all the relations of his useful
life; and while we feel his removal as a deep personal bereave
ment and a great public loss, we yet recognize the fact, that, as
ripened grain, he has been gathered, full of years and honors, to
his rest and reward.
Resolved, That in testimony of our respect for his memory,
we will attend his funeral in a body; that the clerk be directed
to enter these resolutions upon the records of the Board, and to
transmit a copy of the same to the family of the deceased, and
to furnish a copy to the newspapers of the city for publication.
J. C. PARSONS, Clerk.
��REPORT OF THE PRINCIPAL.
To The Board of Directors:
Gentlemen:—The number of pupils in attendance at the
date of my last Report, was two hundred and twenty-four.
Forty-one new pupils have been admitted during the year, and
one former pupil, making the whole number under instruction
two hundred and sixty-six. Forty-one have left the school, and
the number now present is two hundred and twenty-five. These
are arranged in thirteen classes, under eight hearing, and five
deaf-mute teachers, giving each class an average of seventeen
pupils.
While the general health of the family has been excellent, we
have to record the death of two interesting pupils, Myron W.
Day, of South Royalston, Mass., and Alvah-H. Harris, of Ne
ponset, in the same State. The former died on the 13th of May,
1867, from congestion of the lungs, following an attack of mea
sles, and the latter on Feb. 18th, 1868, from erysipelas. Both
were bright, promising boys—successful in their studies, and
loved by their teachers and companions. In the bloom of youth
they were suddenly called away; yet we indulge the hope that
the instruction they were permitted here to receive served to
prepare them for that unknown future they have so unexpected
ly entered. Mr. Arthur H. Whitmore, who had been a member
of our corps of instructors somewhat less than a yean, died from
quick consumption on the 26th of August last. Mr. Whitmore,
after teaching for a year in the Pennsylvania Institution, entered
upon his duties here with characteristic ardor, and proved him
self a skillful and faithful instructor. He was a young man of
pure and lovely character, and of great promise, and his early
death is a serious loss to the profession.
>
�14.
The position thus rendered vacant was filled by the engage
*
ment of Mr. Abel S. Clark, a graduate of Yale, of the class of
1867, who, by the successful experiment of several months, has
already shown a gratifying and satisfactory degree of aptness for
his new work.
The arrangements for securing the health, comfort and educa
tion of so large a family as ours, necessarily involve the most
careful attention. There are so many families personally inter
ested in these arrangements, that a detailed narration of the dai
ly routine of our household may not be unacceptable. The pu
pils, called by one of their number, rise at 5 o’clock in summer,
and at 6 o’clock in winter. Breakfast is served at half-past six,
the time before breakfast in summer being devoted to amuse
ment. At seven the boys repair to the shops (of which we have
three, a tailor’s, cabinet and shoe-shop,) where they are occupied
till a quarter before nine. The larger girls, divided into four sec
tions, engage in domestic duties. One class clear the tables, wash
the dishes in the dining hall, and make the beds; one sweep the
school rooms and halls; a third go to the laundry, while a fourth
engage in plain sewing, and mending their own garments. These
divisions alternate in their several duties once a month. The
pupils under twelve are excused from these arrangements, and
after committing a short lesson spend the time in amusement
At a quarter before nine the boys leave the shops and prepare
themselves for school. At five minutes before nine the pupils,
under the charge of a monitor, quietly, and in perfect order, pro
ceed to the chapel. The service is conducted by the principal,
or one of the instructors, and occupies about fifteen minutes. A
text of scripture is written in large characters upon a slate, so as
to be visible from all parts of the room. This is explained and
commented upon in a simple and practical manner, and a brief
prayer is offered. The entire exercise is in pantomime, or the
natural sign language of the deaf-mute, is intelligible to nearly
all in the room, scarcely excepting the youngest, and brief, sim
ple and practical, is one of great interest and profit to the pupils.
The profound stillness of the company, the fixed attention, and
the intelligent appreciation of the course of remark, as indicated
by the frequent response of the eye and head, are very impres
sive to those who witness the exercise for the first time.
�15
Making careful note of the chapter and verse of the text ex
plained, the pupils repair, in order, to the school rooms for the
instructions of the morning. These are interrupted at half-past
ten by a recess of fifteen minutes, and at 12 o’clock they go to
the dining room. The meal is eminently a social one, the diet
is abundant, varied and acceptable. After dinner comes amuse
ment, always in the open air, when the weather will allow. At
two o’clock school reassembles, and continues till four, when the
pupils go again to the chapel, in the same order as in the morn
ing. Meantime the text explained has been committed to mem
ory, and is spelled on the fingers by one of the boys, and also
by one of the girls, prayer following, and the exercise occupying
about ten minutes. The pupils are then dismissed, and the boys
go again to the shops, where they remain till a quarter before
six. All the girls engage for the same time in plain sewing,
dress-making, knitting, etc. Tea comes at six, and from tea till
study-hours—seven in winter, and till time to light the gas in
summer, is spent in playing, walking or conversation. The
younger pupils go to bed at seven, and the older pupils spend
an hour in study under the care of an instructor. At half-past
nine all retire. On Saturday we have no school, but the boys
work in the shops till eleven o’clock and the girls are busied in
sewing. Then follows the bathing, every pupil having a thor
ough warm bath at least once a week. The afternoon of Satur
day is spent in visiting objects of interest in the city, excursions
to the woods, or games upon the grounds of the Institution.
The boys are supplied with balls and quoits, and with skates and
sleds in their season, and often become quite expert in chess and
checkers. The girls have jumping-ropes, swings, sea-saws,
hoops, croquet, with sleds and skates. The little boys, when out
of school, are under the constant supervision of the AssistantSteward, who sees to their daily ablutions, mingles in their sports,
and devotes himself to their comfort and happiness. The Ma
tron and one of the Assistant-Matrons have special charge of
the girls when out of school, with the care of their clothing,
while the other Assistant superintends the kitchen department,
and house arrangements. The girls cut and make their own
dresses and under.-garments, do their own mending, make all the
�16
sheets, tablecloths, towels and napkins, and boys’ shirts, and
knit all the socks that are furnished the pupils. In the tailor’s
shop the little boys become expert in the use of the needle, and
make jackets and pants. The boys in the cabinet shop not only
learn the use of tools, but make tables, bureaus and desks of ex
cellent workmanship. Those in the shoe-shop acquire a good
knowledge of the trade, and become able to earn good wages.
Order is indispensable in such a community as ours. This is
secured almost entirely by moral means. The pupils, while out
of school are under the care of monitors, who note irregularities
of conduct, rudeness, quarrelling or graver offences. These are
entered upon a book provided for the purpose, and are reviewed
every month by the principal in the chapel. A pupil who has
received no mark of discredit for a month, thus showing entire
correctness of conduct, has his or her name entered upon the
Boll of Honor, where it will remain among the permanent re
cords of the Institution. In addition to this the pupil receives
a badge to be worn upon the person, indicating good behavior.
By this and other methods a strong influence is brought to bear
in the direction of quietness, order and correct deportment, and
the results are in the highest degree gratifying. Among one
hundred and thirty-five boys, many of whom have grown up
without the least restraint or control, ninety-three during one of
the winter months, received this honor, while the offences of the
others were mostly of a trifling character; and of the ninetythree girls eighty-five received a similar commendation. It is
believed that few schools of hearing children, of the same size,
would endure such a test with higher credit.
We have been honored during the year by visits from Gov.
Chamberlain, accompanied by his Council, from Maine, from
Gov. Harriman, of New Hampshire, from the Hon. Secretary and
members of the Board of Education, from Massachusetts, and
from the Hon. John B. Bartlett, Secretary of State, and Com
missioner for Deaf Mutes of Bhode Island. I have also had
the pleasure during the year, as Principal of the Institution, of
visiting the Legislative Bodies of all the States, of New Eng
land, accompanied by pupils in different stages of their course,
showing the proficiency they attain in the various branches of
�17
education and explaining our methods of instruction. The
Delegation was everywhere kindly received, and our rela
tions with these Bodies are of the most friendly character.
In the recent discussions respecting the best methods of edu• eating deaf mutes, we hear much of the French and of the
German schools. As these schools were the pioneers, and for
many years, the only workers in this department of education,
and as they differed materially in their fundamental principles,
as well as in their practical methods, there was an eminent pro
priety in the rival systems receiving their designation from the
countries where they originated. The work of deaf-mute edu
cation, however, has now been prosecuted in this country with
enthusiasm and with the highest success, for more than fifty
years. In no country in Christendom, are there more able and
devoted men engaged in this benevolent work, in none is it
more distinctly recognized as the unquestioned duty of the
State, no where are the pecuniary means and appliances more
liberally and cheerfully provided, and we are free to say, in no
country has the education of the deaf mute been carried to a
higher point, reached a larger class, or been prosecuted on a
broader or more practical basis than in our own. It is quite
time, therefore, and for similar reasons, that as we are beginning
to'have an American Literature, and the phases of a distinct
American nationality, we should speak of an American sys
tem of deaf-mute education. Though our methods do not dif
fer widely from some followed in other countries, they yet have
their peculiar features.
Our system is eminently eclectic.
Selecting the improvements and best features of other systems,
we weave them into one consistent whole, of the highest practi
cal utility. We challenge our brethren engaged in this profes
sion in other countries, to the noble emulation of bringing deaf
mutes to a higher plain of culture, of imparting to them a more
perfect use of the language of their country, of preparing them
more fully for the duties of intelligent citizenship, in fine, of
relieving them more completely from the pressure of their mis
fortune, than is effected in American Institutions, as the result
of the American system of instruction.
3
�18
The Report of the special Joint Committee of the Massachu
setts Legislature, (session of 1867) to whom the subject of deafmute education was referred, and before whom the rival systems
were so fully discussed, came to hand so late, that it could be
noticed only in the briefest manner in the last Report presented to
your Board. The conclusions reached by this able Committee,
after listening to a thorough discussion of the subject, were, for
the most part, those which were then advocated, and have ever
been maintained by this Institution.
Among the “ conclusions ” to which they arrive, are the follow
ing:
“ The sign language and manual alphabet can be taught to all
classes of deaf persons and deaf mutes, and are the most effect
ual means of communicating information to a large majority of
such persons.
“ Your Committee believe that to the majority of those con
genitally deaf, or who lost their hearing in infancy, it (articula
tion) cannot be successfully taught; but that it can to the major
ity of semi-mutes and semi-deaf persons.” p. 16.
The Committee place a higher value on lip-reading, and upon
the ease with which it may be acquired, than our experience will
allow us to do. Alluding, however, to the difficulties attending
it, they make the following quotation from a letter from a cler
gyman, who is himself afflicted with deafness.
“ In order to read on the lips of an individual, it is necessary
that he should speak plainly, deliberately, distinctly, and show
an expressive face. Those who wear a full beard, raise their
voices to a loud tone, speak with great rapidity, so as to run
their words together, are very verbose with long sentences, show
little or no movement of their lips, or keep the teeth closed
together, are seldom or never understood at all.”
They go on to remark:
“ That a small number only can be taught lip-reading by one
teacher, and that when learned, it can be made available only in
a favorable light, and at short distances. Your Committee
felt that at the several hearings, the deaf mutes present, if they
had been taught lip-reading only, could not have obtained any
clear idea of the proceedings, which they were enabled to do by
�■
the manual signs of Prof Bartlett, who acted as interpreter.”—
p. 17.
“
The Committee sensibly remark, with regard to the best
method of instructing deaf mutes, that “ it is a question of pro
portions.” All practical teachers allow,that while all deaf mutes
can be taught thoroughly and well, through the medium of signs, a
portion can be benefitted by instruction in articulation, and can
acquire a certain amount of intelligible speech. The vital point
upon which this controversy turns, is, What is this proportion ?
It is very clear that the line dividing those who can profitably
be taught to speak, from those who cannot, does not run
between children born deaf, and those who lost their hearing even
as late as three or four years of age. The ability to acquire
speech, is affected by other important considerations, such as
acuteness of mental perception, quickness of observation, flexi
bility of the vocal organs, and a retentive memory, any of
which may be wanting in children who have lost their hearing
at a comparatively late period. It not unfrequently happens
that when none of these disabilities exist, and the child can dis
tinguish and imitate the position of the vocal organs, the pitch
of the voice is so disagreeable as to render the speech acquired
intolerable. We are sometimes greatly annoyed by the harsh
tones of adult persons, who from a partial loss of hearing, are
unable to modulate their voices. When the loss of hearing is
total, the attempt at speech is often so discordant that it is seldom
made. We hold in the highest esteem the tones of the human
voice in all their wonderful and varied play and scope, if they
are modulated by a sensitive, delicate ear. But there are few
sounds in nature so intolerable, so grating upon every sensibility
and nerve, as those of the human voice not thus controlled.
There are some sounds in nature that we expect to be harsh and
discordant, and therefore, if unavoidable, we can endure them
with some degree of patience. But rough screeching tones of
the voice are not among these, certainly if there is a more excel
lent way of communication. When to this unpleasantness, is
added an unintelligible utterance which demands frequent repe
tition, taking into the account also, that to acquire this amount
of speech, involves a large expenditure of labor, which brings
�20
no other return, it is hardly a question whether the labor of
acquisition, is compensated by the benefit received. We hold
distinctly, that the natural signs of the deaf mute, for communi
cation on common matters, are not only more agreeable, but more
intelligible than a great mass of this imperfect speech, and where
persons can resort to writing, such speech, if acquired, should
be, in fact actually is set aside. The practical question, there
fore, and the one which in spite of all theories, will decide the
matter among sensible persons, is not what proportion of deaf
mutes can be made, by great labor, to articulate words, which
may to a certain degree be understood, but how many have
voices that will allow them to use their power of speech obtained
at such an expense. Taking into consideration the acknowl
edged loss of mental development involved in all cases in which
articulation is taught, the imperfection of the speech acquired in
many cases, and the chance that the tones may be annoying
and disagreeable, our experience has led us to the conclusion that
very few pupils, except those who are semi-mutes and semi-deaf,
can profitably spend much time in this labor. At the same time,
we fully concede that there are cases of congenital deafness,
where there is on the part of the child, a peculiar flexibility of
the vocal organs, and a bright mind, and on the part of the
friends, intelligence and abundant leisure, in which instruction
in articulation may be properly and successfully given. Even
in these cases, it is too tedious and uncertain to be made the
medium of instruction. It should be given as a means of
communication, and rather as an accomplishment, than as a par
ticularly valuable part of education.
The proposition we are considering, will be materially affected
by the language which it is proposed to communicate orally to
the deaf mute. German, Italian, or French teachers, may suc
ceed in a much larger number of cases, and to a higher degree,than
those who seek to impart the English language. If half the
number of deaf mutes can be taught to speak intelligibly in
these languages, and there is no reliable evidence that nearly
this proportion can be so instructed, it by no means follows that
a like proportion can acquire the same facility in the English
language. Our language confessedly presents peculiar difficul
�21
ties to the deaf mute; difficulties so formidable that those -who
have tried it, with scarcely an exception, agree with the views
already stated as to the number who can be successfully taught.
Mr. E. M. Gallaudet, President of the National Deaf-Mute
College at Washington, and son of the distinguished Founder of
this Institution, has recently visited the prominent schools for
deaf mutes in Europe, to notelaarefully their methods, and par
ticularly their success in teaching articulation. It has been
vauntingly asserted, and no little pains taken to spread the in
pression, that in consequence of this examination, Mr. Gallau
det has reached conclusions differing widely from those adopted
by his venerated father, and his successors in this school, that
he has returned to this country an advocate for material changes
■in the methods followed here, and finally, that his Report proves
that statements we have made respecting methods pursued in
other countries, are at variance with facts. To show how ground
less are such representations, we have only to allow the able
Report of Mr. Gallaudet to speak for itself.
We have maintained that articulation, as a medium of instruc
tion, has, with but one notable exception, been rejected by Brit
ish instructors and Institutions. What says Mr. G.’s Report on
this point?—The following is the testimony of Mr. Charles Ba
ker, the distinguished Principal of the Doncaster Institution:
“ The success hitherto attendant on the. efforts to teach articulation to
the totally deaf, is by no means flattering, and I do not believe there is one
Institution in our country which can produce a dozen pupils whose articu
lation could be understood by indifferent auditors ... I must therefore
decide against giving up the time now bestowed on the acquisition of lan
guage, and useful knowledge, by my pupils, to devote it to the specious
acquirement of articulation.” pp. 12. 13.
After remarking that at the Institution at Edinburgh, under
Mr. Kinniburgh, articulation was the original basis, Mr Baker
says:
“ To my certain knowledge, it early gave way to means more universally
applicable. Of the older Institutions of these Isles, about twenty, not one
has adopted articulation, except in the cases of those pupils who could
hear a little, or who had become deaf after they had acquired speech.” p. 50.
Mr. Hooper, of the Birmingham Institution, one of the oldest
in Great Britain,
�u Is inclined to coincide with Prof. Baker’s view, that the results of the
labor of teaching the great body of deaf mutes artificial speech, and read1ng on the lips, are not of sufficient practical benefit to compensate for the
necessary outlay of time and labor... in the case of the semi-mute and se
mi-deaf, it is the duty of instructors to see that all possible means are taken
to retain and improve what speech is possessed by the pupil. This is done
in the Birmingham school, but no more, in the direction of articula
tion.” p. 13.
Mr. Patterson, of the Manchester Institution,
“ Coincides entirely with Prof. Baker and Mr. Hopper. Although he has
in several cases taught it successfully to congenital mutes, he thinks it im
practicable for any large proportion of the deaf and dumb.” p. 121.
Mr. Buxton, of the Liverpool school, who has had several years
actual experience in this branch of instruction in the London
Institution, says:
“ Articulation was formerly taught in the Liverpool school to a greater
extent than at present. Now, only the semi-mute and semi-deaf are instruc
ted in artificial speech and bp-reading.”
Mr. Buxton mentioned that “many cases in his experience had
arisen, where parents of his pupils particularly requested that
their children should not be taught articulation. The reason for
this, is found in the fact that the artificially acquired utterances
of the deaf, are generally monotonous, and oftentimes disagreea
ble : so unpleasant evidently, in certain cases, as to lead the pa
rents of uneducated mutes to express the desire above referred
to.” p. 16.
The venerable Duncan Anderson, of the Glascow Institution,
who in former years had given much attention to this subject,
and had prepared a valuable manual for use in this branch of
deaf-mute instruction, says:
“ The experience of nearly half a century of personal deaf-mute instruc
tion had led him to abandon all efforts at articulation, save with the semi
deaf and semi-mute.” p. 16.
Again he says:
“ On looking back upon an experience of forty-one years as a teacher of
the deaf and dumb, I am free to confess that the few successful instances
of articulation by deaf mutes which I have witnessed in this and other
countries, were very inadequate to the time and pains bestowed upon
them.” ibid.
�23
The Rev. John Kinghan, of the Institution- of Belfast, Ire.
land,
“ Is as decided in his testimony against articulation as any instructor in
the United Kingdom. He deems it, to use his own words, ‘ worse than use
less in a vast majority of cases;’ including the semi-deaf and semi
mute.” p. 17.
The views of the Principals of the other schools in the British
Isles visited by Mr. Gallaudet, agree entirely with those above
presented, and similar opinions are entertained by the Masters of
several schools on the continent. The gentlemen whose testi
mony is here quoted, are among the oldest and ablest teachers of
deaf mutes in the world. Their lives have been devoted to this
work, and their writings and their labors have placed them in the
highest rank among the benefactors of this class of persons.
Mr. Gallaudet sensibly remarks:
“ The testimony of such experienced instructors as those now conducting
the eight schools declaring against articulation, coupled with the consid
eration that in the majority of them, it has been successfully taught, is en
titled to great weight, while the fact that it is where the English language
is spoken that such strong ground is taken, should not be lost sight of by
Americans.”
It will be noticed that views of British teachers as above ex
pressed, correspond with our own, that few, except the semi-mute
and semi-deaf, can profitably be taught to speak.
Although German teachers make this proportion larger than
this, it does not, in their view, embrace the whole number, or a
majority. Canon de Haerne, of the Institution of Brussels, Bel
gium, while believing “ that a decided majority of so-called deafmutes are unable to acquire any valuable facility in artificial
speech, holds that in addition to the semi-deaf and semi-mute,
about ten per-cent, of congenital mutes, may acquire fluency in
this method of communication.
Signor Tarra, of the Milan Institution, estimates the number
of deaf mutes who may succeed in articulation, at thirty per-cent.,
including the semi-mutes and semi-deaf, and also many who
could not talk readily with strangers.
Mr. Hill, of Weissenfels, who stands at the head of deaf-mute
instruction in Germany, says that out of one hundred, eleven can
converse readily with strangers on ordinary topics. Prof. Vaisse
�24
of the Paris Institution, gives the same proportion. “Out of
ten, the number who can converse with strangers on all subjects,
and with ease, will not extend to more than two, and often to no
more than one.” Of the more than one hundred teachers con
sulted by Mr. Gallaudet, only one claimed that success in arti
culation was the rule among deaf mutes.
These, it will be noticed, are the opinions of gentlemen who
are advocates of the articulating system. The usual average is
thirty per-cent., one placing it at fifty per-cent, and only one
placing it higher than this. Is it not highly probable, without
casting the least reflection on these worthy and able gentlemen,
that the unbiassed judgment of a candid and competent observer,
would make the proportion of clearly successful cases consid
erably smaller than this ?
Mr. Grallaudet states it as his own judgment, that from ten to
twenty per-cent, of the deaf and dumb can profitably be taught
articulation. As the semi-mute and semi-deaf constitute about
half this number, he would thus judge that ten per-cent, of con
genital mutes are worthy of such instruction. This we believe
to be a larger number than any experiment yet made in the En
glish language will warrant, nor do we think it desirable for the
sake of a possible benefit conferred upon this proportion, to sub
ject thd whole number to the tedious and exhausting processes
of artificial speech, during the first year of their instruction. Mr.
G. gives his final conclusions on this point, in the following de
cided language:
“ It is plainly evident from what is seen in the articulating schools of Eu’rope, and from the candid opinions of the best instructors, that oral lan
guage, cannot in the fullest sense of the term, be mastered by a majority of
deaf mutes. ... It should be regarded as an accomplishment attain
able by a minority only. . . . The numbei’ of those born deaf who
can acquire oral language is small, and their success may justly be attribu
ted to the possession of peculiar talents or gifts, involving almost preternat
ural quickness of the eye in detecting the slight variations in positions of
the vocal organs in action, and a most unusual control over the muscles of
the mouth and throat.” p. 53.
It is indeed evident from Mr. Gallaudet’s observations, that if
there has been any change in the views of teachers on the Con
tinent within the last ten years, it has been quite as distinctly a
�26
Movement towards the use of signs as towards articulation.
While in some schools in which the latter method was formerlydisused, a portion of the pupils are now taught to speak, in
others in which articulation was the sole method, signs are freely
used and highly valued. In place of the theory once quite
general among the disciples of Heinicke, that all deaf mutes of
sound mental development could be taught to speak, and that
inability to acquire speech, indicated a want of ordinary capacity,
it is now generally admitted, on the one hand, that a large class can
only be successfully instructed by signs, and on the other, that
they are an important adjunct in teaching articulating pupils.
With regard to the value of signs in the instruction of all
classes of deaf mutes, the opinion of prominent German teach
ers is emphatic and decided. Mr. Hill states his views in the
strongest terms. Speaking of proscribing every species of pan
tomimic language, he says:
“ This pretence is contrary to nature, and repugnant to the rules of sound
educational science. If this system were put into execution, the moral
life, the intellectual development of the deaf and dumb, would be inhu
manly hampered. It would be acting contrary to nature to forbid the deaf
mute a means of expression employed even by hearing and speaking per
sons. ... To banish the language of natural signs from the school
room and limit ourselves to articulation, is like employing a golden key
which does not fit the lock of the door we would open, and refusing to use
the iron one made for it. . -. . Where is the teacher, who can consci
entiously declare that he has discharged his duty, in prosponing moral and
religious education until he can impart it by means of articulation ? ”—
p. 29.
Mr. Hill acknowledges in the language of natural signs, among
a number of other particulars which he mentions, the following
excellencies:
—“ One of the two universally intelligible innate forms of expression
granted by God to mankind—a form which is in reality more or less em
ployed by every human being.
—The element in which the mental life of the deaf mute begins to germi
nate and grow; the only means whereby he, on his admission to the school,
may express his thoughts, feelings and wishes.
—An instrument of mental development and substantial instruction, made
use of in the intercourse of the pupils with each other; for example, the
well known beneficial influences which result from the association of the
new pupils with the more advanced.
I
�26
—A most efficacious means of assisting even pupils in the higher degrees
of school training, giving light, warmth, animation to spoken language,
which for sometime after its introduction, continues dull and insipid.”—
p. 30.
Of its aid in religious instruction Mr. Hill remarks:
“ It is particularly in the teaching of religion, that the language of pan
tomime plays an important part, especially when it is not only necessary to.
instruct, but to operate on sentiment and will; either because here this lan
guage is indispensable to express the moral state of man, his thoughts and
his actions, or that the word alone
too little impression on the eye of
the mute to produce without the aid of pantomime, the desired effect in a
manner sure and sufficient.” p. 30, 31.
We have no where met with a more appreciative exposition
of the real significance and value of natural signs in the educa
tion of the deaf and dumb, than these forcible paragraphs of Mr.
Hill.
We will close our quotations with the decided and emphatic
testimony of Mr. Gfallaudet in favor of the American system of
deaf-mute education.
“ It is hardly needful for me to say, after what has been said in this Re
port, that nothing in my foreign investigations has led me to question the
character of the foundation on which the system of instruction pursued in
our American Institutions is based. The edifice is built on the rock of
sound philosophy; its comer stone is universal applicability; its materials
are cemented by consistency and success, while for its crowning beauty it
has a dome of high educational attainment, loftier and more grand than
can be seen in the nations of the Old World.” p. 53.
We have made these copious extracts from this able and in
teresting Report, partly from the relation of its author to the
founder of our own school, and partly because the Report itself,
has been confidently quoted as a distinct condemnation of the
methods and principles which have been advocated here, from
the beginning to the present time.
We entered into this discussion at the outset, and have con
tinued it, with no partisan spirit, The principles upon which
our Institution was founded, and has since been conducted, were
sharply assailed. Our sole object has been to show that we are
not beating the air, but are working intelligently and success
fully to secure grand and important ends: that the methods we
adopt for this purpose, are sanctioned by sound philosophy, as
�well as by the experience of the most able men who have turned
their attention to this subject. We regard no Institution or school
as in any sense a rival in this good work, but hail with satisfac
tion every honest effort to help on the education, and consequent
elevation of the unfortunate mute. Wedded mechanically to
no system for its own sake, or for any prestige of antiquity or
association, we strive to give our pupils the best education which
science, skill and faithful instruction, under the best methods,
can impart.
The semi-mute and semi-deaf children who are sent to us, have
always received special attention. While by instruction, through
the medium of signs, their minds have been sedulously culti
vated, we have been careful to retain and improve all their pow
er of speech. This has sometimes been done by assigning to
this class a special teacher, and at other times by placing them
under speaking instructors, and holding with them constant oral
communication. We propose still to give these children every
desirable advantage, assigning to them a special instructor, if the
numbers will warrant it; if not, taking care, by other methods,
that the facility of speech which some of them possess, shall not
be lost. We deem this discussion as in all respects fortunate and
timely, as it has served to bring not only the real calamity of the
deaf mute, but also the best means of relieving it, more distinct
ly to public attention. We have no apprehension respecting the
verdict of sensible persons who will review the whole subject.
The newspapers* sent our pupils, for the most part weekly
issues from the vicinity of their own homes, contribute so mani
festly not only to their enjoyment, but also to their intellectual
progress, that they are worthy of distinct mention. Before his
education commences, the deaf mute is shut out to a great degree
from a knowledge of the events occurring in the world around
him. A happy change comes over him when, on entering the In
stitution, he is brought within the electric circle of intelligence,
and becomes informed, even through others, of what is daily
transpiring in the busy world. When his education is so far ad
vanced that he can read for himself from the columns of a pa
per the record of passing events, his interest is unbounded. It
/
* Appendix, No. TV.
�28
is often surprising to notice the extent to which even those
whose ability to use language, from the short time they have
been at school, is quite limited, yet are able to spell out the
meaning of a paragraph containing some item of news from fa
miliar localities, while the large class of more advanced pupils
read the papers with intelligent facility, and with far more enjoy
ment than is usual with hearing persons. The papers are regu
larly distributed, care being taken to supply the children with
issues from their own neighborhood. They are perused with
eagerness, and there are few communities more thoroughly posted
in the current news of the day than our own.
The walls of the Institution have received some graceful and
most acceptable decorations during the year. An excellent set
of the Cartoons of Raphael, presented by the Rev. J. D. Hull,
of New York, have been handsomely framed and placed in the
girls’ sitting room, where they are a constant joy to many observ
ing and admiring eyes. Mr. R. S. DeLamater, and Messrs. Web
ster & Popkins, have each presented us with a highly finished
photograph of the venerable Laurent Clerc, while Messrs. Prescott
& White, have furnished fine copies of the old and well engraved
portraits of those magnates of deaf-mute education, the Abbe
De 1’ Epee, and the Abbe Sicard. These pictures are finished
in the highest style of art, and as long as the Institution shall
stand, they will remain on its walls, speaking representatives of
these benefactors of the Deaf and Dumb, and of the skill of the
generous artists who have so faithfully perpetuated their memoryA citizen of Hartford, who is in the habit of such kind deeds,
but whose modesty prefers that his name shall be withheld, has
gained for himself a warm place in the hearts of our pupils by
the gift of two barrels of luscious oranges, to aid them in cele
brating the holidays.—Our acknowledgements are due to Messrs.
J. Gr. Batterson and J. W. Stancliff for the high gratification en
joyed by our pupils of repeatedly visiting the collection of beau
tiful paintings on exhibition at the Wadsworth Atheneum during
the month of March.—Miss Dix, whose generous sympathy for
the suffering and unfortunate, has gained for her so noble a rep
utation, has sent our pupils ten dollars, as an indication of her
interest in their welfare, desiring the sum to be spent in some
�29
way which shall contribute to their gratification.—Mr. J. R.
Burnet, of Newark, N. J., has sent us some carefully drawn
views of places in the Holy Land.—We are indebted to the
American Tract Society, of Boston, for the acceptable grant of
one hundred and fifty copies of the “ Child’sPaper,” and for
twenty-five copies of the “ Christian Banner.”—Hon. A. D. Ha
ger, of Proctorsville, Vt., has presented to the Library of the In
stitution two valuable volumes on the geology of Vermont.—We
are also indebted to the Hon. L. S. Foster for valuable Public
Documents.
With devout gratitude to God for His watchful care over eve
ry department of the Institution during the year that is past, we
invoke upon its future course His continued guidance and bles
sing.
COLLINS STONE,
Principal.
American Asylum, )
May 16,1868.
f
��REPORT OF THE PHYSICIAN.
The year just closed, adds another to the catalogue of those
during which the general health of this large household has
been usually very good.
•
There have been but two periods, and these of brief duration,
during which the pupils have suffered from diseases of conse
quence, or which affected any considerable number. One of
these occurred soon after my last Report was presented to your
Board, when measles made its appearance, and included in the
course of the outbreak about eighty cases. Several of them
were quite severe, and one died of congestive pneumonia, which
suddenly supervened upon the ordinary pulmonary symptoms.
The duration of this malady did not much, if at all, exceed
three weeks, ceasing, doubtless, for want of subjects.
Soon after the commencement of the fall term, an affection of
the eyes appeared in the form of acute ophthalmia, varying in
severity, but generally easily controlled, and soon terminating
favorably in most cases. It was confined principally to the
boys, very few girls comparatively, suffering from it.
The cause, though probably local, eluded the most careful
search, and still occasionally manifests its presence in a sporadic
case.
A case of malignant pustule occurred in February last, in the
person of one of the larger boys, terminating fatally in about
thirty-six hours from the time it was first seen professionally.
A single case of fracture of the fore-arm, occurring in a little
boy, concludes, it may be said with almost exact truth, the list
of ailments which have come under my observation during the
year, the usual acute pulmonary and other diseases so com
mon during Spring and Autumn, not having appeared, being
planted perhaps, by those before named.
�The Hygiene of the Institution, to which the utmost import
ance is justly attached, continues to be strictly observed in each
and all of those particulars to which reference has been had in
my former Reports, and which are so intimately connected both
with the health and the effective working capacity of the pupils.
E. K. HUNT, M. D.
Hartford, May 6th, 1868.
��,
.
“
“
“
T
T
•
•
I n s u r a n c e , .................................
a lbrf ry,
-
,
-
363.00
100.00
1,189.37
53,000.00
678.00
1.
“
“
“
“
“
1867.
April 1. By
1868.
“
P u p ils ,
—
---- 7
’
’
1
’
$104,566.86
_
Treasurer.
'
’
Ci
balance on hand,
sgp 27
Income from the fund the year past, 17 74217
Rent of Dwellings,
.
’
47500
Paying
.............................................
3 236.84
Receipts from the six N. E. States for support of Beneficiaries,
. V .
36 187 50
Receipts from Fund Account,
46 500 00
Advanced to A. Blodget Estate, repaid,
345 08
— ---- __ ------- ------------------------------------------------------$104,566.86_______________
Examined and found correct. We have also this day examined the vouch~
~
ers for the securities owned by the American Asylum, as per Inventory of
t iz x t *
-mr .
the Treasurer, and find them to agree with the same.
ROLAND MATHER,
ERASTUS COLLINS, ) A ...
T
T
JONA. B. BUNCE,
Auditors.
Hartford, May 16, 1868.
Hartford, April 1, 1868.
Sundry Expenses,
“ Reinvestments, “ Fund Account,”
“ Balance to Cr. of New Account, -
‘
u
..
‘
“
.
Paid Orders of Directing Committee, in favor
of Henry Kennedy, Steward, the
o , year past,
$28,500.00 April
“
for S a la r ie s , ....................................
20,036.42
((
Annuity to Laurent Clerc, - 700.00
.
A m e r ic a n . A s y lu m in a c c o u n t w ith . R o la n d . M a th e r , T r e a s u r e r .
u
((
1868.
April 1. To Cash
A BSTRA CT OF T H E T R E A SU R ER S ACCOUNT.
A F F E N B IX .
I.
�II. STATEMENT
OF THE FUND OF AMERICAN ASYLUM.
Invested in Bank Stocks in Connecticut,
“
on Bond and Mortgage of Beal Estate,
“
in Railroad Bonds,
“
in United States Bonds, Real Estate in Hartford,
Furniture in the Institution,
Cash on hand,
...
.
-
$94,100.00
88,500.00
23,900.00
7,000.00
, 82,522.88
5,390.00
■
678.07
$302,090.95
Hartford, May 16, 1868.
�36
III.
Dr.
ABSTRACT OF
American Asylum in account with Henry
To Flour,
“ Meal,
“ Cakes and Crackers, . “ Rice and Corn Starch,
“ Yeast, “ Hay and Straw,
“ Provender and Oats,
“ Live Stock,
“ Tools, Blacksmithing, &c.,
“ Butter,
££ Charcoal,
“ Hard Coal, “ Wood, “ Furniture, “ Groceries,
- •
“ Light and Gas Bills,
“ Meat, Fish and Fowl, ££ Medicine,
“ Miscellaneous, “ Pupils,
££ Repairs and Improvements,
£; Schools and Postage,
“ Cabinet Shop, “ Shoe
££
“ Tailor ££
“ Vegetables and Fruits,
“ Wages,
- ,
££ Washing and Soap,
££ Water Works, -
Balance to new account,
-
1 , -
$3,724.70
9.00
39.41
81.11
119.00
265.51
620.14
455.00
466.76
3.125.33
445.65
2.354.78
38.25
1,113.84
2,265.32
802.10
4,169.48
267.92
548.98
1,011.54
1.862.34
476.23
1.497.78
2,045.83
549.80
859.44
3,086.26
649.98
128.40
$33,079.88
187.83
$33,267.71
�37
CURRENT EXPENSES.
Kennedy, Steward, for the year ending April 1, 1868.
By Cash from Treasurer,
“ State of Massachusetts,
"
"
"
"
Rhode Island,
"
"
"
"
Vermont,
"
"
"
"
Connecticut,
"
"
"
"
Maine,
"
"
"
"
New Jersey,
"
"
"
"
Pupils,
"
"
"
"
Individuals,
"
"
"
"
Cabinet Shop,
"
"
"
"
Shoe
“
"
"
"
"
Tailor
“ "
"
"
"
Miscellaneous,
“ Balance from old account,
-
-
-
-
- '
-
American Asylum, Hartford, April 1st, 1868.
Cr.
$28,500.00
768.75
34.17
107.78
162.73
487.50
37.52
1,158.23
1,521.60
67.30
210.89
35.81
8.84
176.59
$33,267.71
�38
IV.
PAPERS, PERIODICALS, &o.
THE FOLLOWING PAPERS HAVE BEEN SENT TO THE PUPILS GRATUITOUSLY DURING THE
PAST YEAR.
Name.
ASgis and Gazette,
Weekly,
American Traveler,
Anamosa Eureka,
Argus and Patriot,
Boston Advertiser,
Daily,
Boston Courier,
Weekly,
Boston Journal,
Boston Transcript,
Burlington Free Press,
Burlington Times,
Christian Mirror,
Christian Secretary,
Churchman,
Columbian Register,
Congregationalist,
Connecticut Courant,
Connecticut Herald and Journal,
Deaf Mute Casket,
Monthly,
Eastern Argus,
,
Weekly,
Fitchburg Sentinel,
Hartford Courant,
Daily,
Hartford Post,
Hartford Times,
Independent Democrat,
Weekly,
Kenebec Journal,
Maine Farmer,
Maine State Press,
44
Massachusetts Spy,
44
Mirror and Farmer,
44
Natick Times,
New Hampshire Patriot and Gazette
“
“
Statesman,
“
“
Telegraph,
“ London Democrat,
‘ ‘ York Evangelist,
“
“ Spectator,
“
“ State Radii,
Northampton Free Press,
!Semi-Weekly,
Norwich Courier,
Weekly,
Portland Advertiser,
Portland Transcript,
44
Providence Journal,
41
Religious Herald,
Republican Standard,
Rhode Island Free Press,
Rutland Herald,44
Union Democrat,
Vermont Christian Messenger,
Vermont Watchman and State Journal,
Vineyard Gazette,
14
Waterbury American,
44
Willimantic Journal,
44
Worcester Palladium,
44
Zion’s Herald,
Editors and Publishers.
Where Published.
S. B. Bartholomew & Co., Worcester, Mass.
Worthington, Flanders & Co., Boston,
“
Edmund Booth & Son,
Anamosa, Iowa.
Hiram Atkins,
Montpelier, Vt.
Dunbar, Waters & Co.,
Boston, Mass.
George Lunt & Co.,
44
44
Charles O. Rodgers,
44
44
Henry W. Dutton & Son,
G. G. & B. L. Benedict,
Burlington, Vt.
George H. Bigelow,
Charles A. Lord,
Portland, Me.
E. Cushman,
Hartford, Conn.
Osborn & Baldwin,
New Haven, “
W. L. Greene & Co.,
Boston, Mass.
Hawley, Goodrich & Co.,
_______ Conn.
Hartford,______
Carrington, Hotchkiss & Co., New Haven, Ct.
W. J. Palmer,
"
Raleigh, N. C.
John M. Adams & Co.,
Portland, Me.
Garfield & Stratton,
Fitchburgh. Mass.
Hawley^Goodrich & Co..
Hartford, Conn.
Sperry, Hall & Co.,
Burr Brothers,
Independent Press Association, Concord, N.H.
------ “ Sayward,
Augusta, Me.
Stevens & "
True & Boardman,
N. A. Foster & Co.,
Portland, “
J. D. Baldwin & Co.,
Worcester, Mass.
John B. Clarke,
Manchester, N. H.
Washington Clapp,
Natick, Mass.
William Butterfield,
Concord, N. H.
McFarland & Jencks,
Dearborn & Berry,
Nashua, N. H.
D. S. Ruddock,
New London, Conn.
Field & Craighead,
New York City.
Levi S. Backus,
Canajoharie, N. Y.
Albert R. Parsons,
Northampton, Mass.
Norwich, Conn.
Bulletin Association,
Smith & Wiltham,
Portland, Me.
Elwelf, Pickard & Co.,
Knowles, Anthony & Danielson, Prov., R. I.
’ ’ i,
Hartford, Conn.
D. B. Mosely,
John D. Candee,
Bridgeport, Conn.
Providence, R. I.
Providence Press Co.,
Rutland, Vt.
Manchester, N. H.
Campbell & Hanscom,
Montpelier, Vt.
C. W. Willard,
E. P. Walton,
Edgartown, Mass.
Charles M. Vincent,
Waterbury, Conn.
E. B. Cook & Co.,
Curtis & Jackson,
Willimantic, Conn.
J. S. C. Knowlton,
Worcester, Mass.
Boston, Mass.
Haven & Rand,
�The Presidents and Superintendents of the following Railroads will
please accept our thanks for special favors shown to the pupils of the
Institution during the year.
Boston & Albany.
Boston & Maine.
Boston & Providence.
Concord, Manchester & Lawrence.
Connecticut & Passumpsic.
Connecticut River.
Hartford, New Haven & Springfield.
Hartford, Providence & Fishkill.
Portland & Kennebec.
Rutland & Burlington.
Vermont Central.
Worcester & Nashua.
COLLINS STONE, Principal.
Hartford, May 16, 1868.
�I
I
I
�V.
LIST OF PUPILS,
IN THE SCHOOL WITHIN THE YEAR ENDING ON THE 16TH OF MAY, 1868.
MALES.
Residence.
Name.
Abbott, W. John.........
Abbott, William W...
Acheson, Charles.........
Acheson, George W..
Aldrich, Erwin E.........
Anderson, Wallace E.
Bailey, Arthur E.........
Baker, Jesse H...........
Baldwin, Charles F....
Barrett, William S....
Bastinella, Oliver.........
Blodget, Frank P.........
Bond, Thomas S...........
Bowler, Albert 0 ....
Boyington, George W.
Branch, Degrand, D. L
Brown, Alpheus E....
Butler, John.................
Cain, Cornelius............ .
Campbell, John,...........
Carter, William T....
Cary, Daniel W...........
Chapman, Albert W...
Clark, Frank H.............
Clark, John ...................
Conley, James..............
Conners, John J............
Cook, Thomas.........
Coughlin, William........
Crandall, William F...
Crane, John E...............
Cronan, Stephen..........
6
Admission.
.. Sidney, Me., ......................... Sept., 1865
..Northumberland, N. H., ..Sept., 1861
..West Randolph, Mass.,....... Sept., 1864
.. West Randolph, Mass.,... .Sept., 1864
. .Smithfield, R. I.,..........
.Sept., 1864
..South Framingham, Mass.,.Sept., 1867
.Poland, Me., ......................... Sept., 1866
.Manchester, N. H., ........... Sept., 1867
.Litchfield, Conn., ................ Sept., 1864
..Plymouth, Mass., ................ Sept., 1865
. .Pittsfield, Mass., .................. Sept., 1865
.Nashua, N. H., ............ ..Sept., 1867
..Hartford, Conn., ............ .Sept., 1860
.Rockland, Me.,..................... Sept., 1867
..Prentiss, Me.,........................ Nov., 1860
.Hartford, Conn.,.................. Sept., 1866
..North Dunbarton, N. H., ..Sept., 1867
. .East Boston, Mass., ............. Sept., 1863
.Lewiston, Me.,..................... Sept.,. 1867
.Danbury, Conn., ______
Nov., 1867
.Boston, Mass.,.......................Oct., 1866
Gardiner, Me., ................... Sept., 1860
.Cambridgeport, Mass.,........... Sept., 1865
..East Hampton, Mass.,__ .Sept., 1867
.Monson, Mass.,.....................Sept., 1865
.Newport. R. I., .................... Oct., 1861
.Mansfield, Mass., ................. Sept., 1865
.Portland, Me., .....................Sept., 1865
Fitchburgh, Mass., ............. Sept., 1862
Newport, R. I.,..................... Sept., 1860
. Whiting, Me., .......................Feb., 1868
Fitchburgh, Mass.,.............. Sept., 1862
�42
Name.
Cross, Samuel S....
Culver, Samuel L...
Cummings, Daniel...
Cutter, George F...
Damon, Frank C...
Daniels, Orson.........
Davis, Edwin A....
Day, Myron W....
Derby, Ira H...........
Dougherty, Charles
Drew, Frank H....
Drown, Carlos.........
Duran, Edward.....
Duran, Thomas........
Ellis, Manford...........
Erbe, Hermann....
Evans, Oscar H....
Fahy, Thomas.........
Ferris, John.............
Fifield, Oscar W...
Fish, Charles...........
Fitch, Henry H....
Freallick, James F..
Frisbee, Edward W
Frost, Edwin F....
Gale, Arthur F....
Gambol, John..........
Gardner, William M.
Graham, Samuel....
Halsey, Waldron H.
Hargrave, Albert C.
Harris, Alvah H....
Hawley, Levi R....
Hawley, Lewis N..
Hayden, Othello D..
Helfpenny, Martin..
Hill, Willie L.........
Jellison, Simon.........
Residence.
Admission.
Beverly, Mass.,................... Sept., 1864
.Waterville, Conn.,.............. Sept., 1866
Greeneville, Conn................ Sept., 1864
.Irasburgh, Vt.,.................. Sept., 1865
.Amherst, N. H.................... Sept., 1861
.North Adams, Mass., ....Sept., 1867
..Auburn, Me.,..................... Sept., 1867
.South Royalston, Mass., ..Sept., 1864
.South Weymouth, Mass., .Sept., 1861
.Hartford, Conn., ................. Sept., 1863
, .Boston, Mass.,.................... Sept., 1865
.Browningtori, Vt.,............ Sept., 1861
..South Boston, Mass.,........ Sept., 1865
..South Boston, Mass., ....Sept., 1865
.Belgrade, Me.,.................... Sept., 1864
. Southington, Conn.,........... Sept., 1865
.South Royalston, Mass., . ..Sept., 1861
.Pittsfield, Mass., ................ Sept., 1862
. Waitsfield, Vt.,.................... Dec., 1862
.Deer Isle, Me.,.................... Nov., 1862
.Danby, Vt.,.........................Sept., 1865
.Preston, Conn.,.................. Sept., 1860
..Provincetown, Mass., ....Sept., 1865
.Charlestown, Mass., ......... Sept., 1866
.Boston, Mass.,.................... Sept., 1861
. Charlton, Mass.,................. Sept., 1863
. South Boston, Mass.,.......... Oct., 1864
.Hardwick, Mass.,................Sept., 1864
.Newark, N. J.,................. zSept., 1866
.Newark, N. J.,
..........Nov., 1863
.East Boston, Mass.,............ Sept., 1867
.Neponset, Mass.,................ Oct., 1863
.North Amherst, Mass., .. ..Sept., 1865
.North Amherst, Mass., .. ..Sept., 1865
.Stoughton, Mass.,............... Sept., 1863
• Waterbury, Conn.,............. Sept., 1864
.Athol Depot, Mass.,........... Sept., 1864
.Monroe, Me.,.......................Sept., 1865
�43
Name.
Residence.
Admission.
Johnson, George D............ Erving, Mass.,...................... .... Sept.,
Josselyn, Andrew P......... East Foxboro, Mass.,.......... .... Sept.,
Kendall, Phillip................. Whitefield, Me.,................ .........Sept.,
King, James H................. Middletown Point, N. J., . .... Sept.,
Ladd, Amos A.................. East Haddam, Conn.,.......... .... Sept.,
Ladue, Edward................. St. Albans, Vt.,................ ... .... Sept.,
Lally, John......................... South Boston, Mass.,.......... .... Sept.,
Laplant, Peter................... West Milton, Vt.,.............. ... .Nov.,
Leary, Matthew................. Boston, Mass.,...................... .... Sept.,
Lewis, Willie H................. Providence, R. I.,.............. ......... Sept.,
Mackintosh, George........... Canton, Mass.,.................... .... Sept.,
Marr, IraR......................... North Washington, Me., ... .... Sept.,
Marston, Westley N......... Greenland, N. H.,.............. .... .Sept.,
Martin, Charles H............. Salem, Mass.,...................... ......... Sept.,
Mayhew, Jared................. Chilmark, Mass., ................ . -... Sept.,
Mayo, Hawes...................... Monroe, Me.,....................... ......... Sept.,
McCarty, John................... Andover, Mass.,.................. .... Sept.,
McDonnell, John............... West Stockbridge, Mass., . .... Sept.,
McGirr, Francis................. East Cambridge,Mass., .. ......... Sept.,
McKinney, Wm. J.............Alleghany City, Penn., ... .... Sept.,
McMaster, Hugh H. B... .Pittsburgh, Penn.,............. .... Sept.,
McMechen, James H.........Wheeling, West Virginia, .........Aug.,
Meagher, Michael............... Waterbury, Conn.,.............. .... Sept.,
Miller, George................... Providence, R. I.,.............. .... Sept.,
Mitchell, Isaac................... Brookville, Vt., .................. .... Sept.,
Morrell, Leland................. Cornish, Me.,...................... .... Sept.,
Moseley, Joseph A........... Pomfret, Conn.,.................. .... Sept.,
Moulton, Thomas... A... Buxton Centre, Me.,......... ......... Sept.,
Muth, John.......................... Hartford, Conn., ........ .... Sept.,
Negus, Edward R............ Salisbury, Conn.,................ .... Sept.,
Nelson, James. ................. Tewksbury, Mass.,.............. .... Sept.,
*
O’Harra, John................... Milford, Mass.,..................... .... Sept.,
O’Neil, John......................Thorndike, Mass.,.............. ......... Sept.,
O’Neil, Michael................. Charlestown, Mass.,............ .... Sept.,
Ould, Edward C................. Derby, Conn.,..................... ......... Sept.,
Page, Roscoe G............. .. . Augusta, Me.,.................... .........Sept.,
Pattee, Wilbur D............... Alexandria, N. H., .......... .... Sept.,
Patterson, Charles.............. Saco, Me., . ......................... ......... Sept.,
Paul, John E..................... Cambridgeport, Mass., .... .... Sept.,
1862
1868
1865
1865
1866
1864
1866
1866
1863
1867
1864
1867
1864
1863
1864
1865
1865
1865
1863
1865
1864
1865
1865
1861
1867
1865
1862
1864
1865
1866
1864
1860
1867
1866
1861
1860
1867
1864
1867
�44
Name.
Residence.
Peterson, Willie S. H......... South Plymouth, Mass., .
Philbrook, Henry 0......... Charlestown, Mass., .........
Pick, William C................. Providence, R. I.,............
Pond, Nathan L................. Milford, Mass., ..................
Porter, Wendell P............. Somerville, Mass.,............
Powers, James.................... Boston, Mass., ..................
Powers, James A........... ,. Salem, Mass.,.....................
Pratt, John W....................Middletown, Conn.,..........
Quincy, Josiah....................Munson, Mass.,...................
Richmond, Ephraim H... .Voluntown, Conn., .........
Rideout, Charles H........... Houlton, Maine,................
Roberts, Frank B............... Boston, Mass., ..................
Rudolph, William............. Boston, Mass.,..................
Ryan, John.......................... Rutland, Vt.,....................
Sachse, Charles F............... Waterbury, Conn., ..........
Sackett, Charles E..............South Glastenbury, Conn.,
Saul, Willie H ..................Salem, Mass.,......................
Scoles, William M........... Augusta, Me.,.....................
Seamen, Mortimer W.... Rockville, Conn.,.............
Sharts, Herman H........... Hudson, N. Y.,...................
Skelly, Edwin J............... Rochester, N. H.,...............
Slattery. Patrick............... Boston, Mass.,................... .
Small, Albert A................. Auburn, Me.,......................
Small, George B............... Hartland, Vt.,.....................
Small, Walter R........ Hartland, Vt.,.................
Smith, Freeman N............. Chilmark, Mass.,.................
Smith, George................. Springfield, Mass.,.............
Smith, Orlando A............. Roxbury, Mass.,.................
Soper Isaac N................... Lowell, Mass.,....................
Sparrow, Wilber N........... Eastham, Mass.,.................
Stevens, William.............. Stonington, Conn.,...............
Sullivan, Patrick J........ Boston, Mass.,...........
Tufts, Samuel A................. Malden, Mass.,...................
Walker, Freddie............... Norwich, Conn.,.................
Wardman, Samuel ........... Ballardvale, Mass.,.............
Waters, Warren L......... .. Hartford, Conn.,........
Watts, Francis A........... Rockville, Conn,,...............
Weaver, Jonathan........... South Woodstock, Conn.,.
Webb, Clarence A............. Canterbury, Conn.,............ ,
Admission.
. Sept., 1862
. Sept., 1864
. April, 1863
. Sept., 1862
.Nov., 1858
. Sept., 1865
. Mar., 1862
. Sept., 1861
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1863
. Sept., 1866
.Sept., 1866
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1861
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1866
. Sept., 1863
. Sept., 1866
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1867
. Sept., 1862
. Sept., 1863
. Sept,, 1865
.. Oct., 1862
. Sept., 1861
. Sept., 1864
. Sept., 1863
. Sept., 1861
. Sept., 1864
. Sept., 1867
, Sept., 1860
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1864
Sept., 1866
, Sept., 1865
Sept., 1860
Sept., 1866
Sept., 1864
�45
Name.
Residence.
Admission.
Wellington, Elbridge A .. Wayland, Mass.,........................ Sept.,
Wentworth, Sylvester W. Ipswich, Mass.,............................ Sept.,
Wheeler Staunton F..... Plymouth, Vt.,............................ Sept.,
White, Henry,................... Roxbury, Mass., .......................... Sept.,
Wilkinson, John................. West Lubec, Me., .. ..................... Sept.,
Winslow, John N............. Putnam, Conn.,............................. Sept.,
Wood, Eugene W........... Webster, Mass.,................. .......... Sept.,
1863
1864
1863
1866
1861
1867
1861
FEMALES.
Adams, Alda M.......... ... Charlestown, Mass.,............. .. .Sept., 1866
Annan, Josephine A...... Manchester, N. H.,.............. .. .Sept., 1864
Atkins, Sylvia B.......... ... Chatham, Mass.,................... ...Sept., 1862
Axt, Matilda................ . ... New Haven, Conn.,............. ... Sept., 1866
Ayshers, Mary........... . ... Hartford, Conn.,................... ....Feb., 1867
Barnard, Ada J........... ... Lowell, Mass.,....................... .. .Sept., 1865
Barry, Anna B........... . ... Baltimore, Md.,.................... .. .Sept., 1867
Bishop, Stella M.......... ... East Avon, Conn.,............... . . .Sept., 1866
Bond, Juba P................ ,.. Hartford, Conn.,.................... .. .June, 1865
Brown, Emily C.......... ... North Stonington, Conn.,... .. .Sent., 1864
Brown, Susan F...........,.. North Dunbarton, N. H., .. .. .Nov., 1865
Carey, Mary................... ,.. Boston, Mass.,...................... .. .Sept., 1863
Carroll, Mary E.......,.. South Boston, Mass.,............ ...Sept,, 1867
Case, Lillie A............... ... East Avon, Conn.,............... ... .Oct., 1867
Chaffin, Abbie L........... ... Worcester, Mass.,................ ...Sept., 1865
Champion, Ellen J .... .. Westmore, Vt.,.................... ...Sept., 1863
Clapp, Elmina D.............. Newburgh, N. Y.,............... . ..Sept., 1860
Clark, Millie H............. .. Biddeford, Me.,........ . .......... ... Sept., 1867
Cole, Lizzie M............... .. Concord, N. H.,................... ...Sept., 1867
Colley, Mary E............. .. Falmouth, Me.,..................... .. ..Oct., 1862
Corcoran, Ellen............. .. East Boston, Mass.,............. .. .Nov., 1865
Daley, Nancy J............. .. Chester, Conn.,.................... .. .Sept., 1865
Darghan, Joanna........... .. New Haven, Conn.,............. ...Sept., 1867
Dewsnap, Clara............. .. Lakeville, Conn.,.................... .. .Jan., 1863
Driscoll, Julia A........... .. East Boston, Mass.,............... . ..Nov., 1865
�46
Name.
Residence.
Dube, Adeline ....
Orono, Me.,...............
Duffy, Ellen.............
Boston, Mass.,...........
Dummer, Caroline L
Weld, Me.,.................
Dunnell, Manila ...
Buxton Center, Me.,.
Durbrow, Carrie B..
New York City,....,
Eaton, Mary E........
East Salisbury, Mass.,
Emerson, Gertrude A.... Danby, Vt.,......................
Fahy, Bridget..................... Pittsfield, Mass., ..............
Flagg, Clarinda J............. Natick, Mass., ................ .
Foley, Bridget................... Bristol, Conn., ................
Foley, Mary A...........
Bristol, Conn.,.................
Frost, Harriet E................. Bucksport, Me.,................. ,
Gardner, Rosa.................... Greeneville, Conn., ...........
Gray, Leonora C............... New Haven, Conn., ....
Hall, Elizabeth................. Portland, Me., ..................
Harper, Sarah L................. New London, Conn.,....
Hartshorn, Anna S......... .'. Boston, Mass., ..;............
Hichens, Mary W............. "Wellfleet, Mass., ..............
Howe, Eldora M............... Marlboro, Mass.,..............
Hull, Ida A........................ Plainville, Conn.,..............
Hull, Josephine D............. Farmington, Conn.,..........
Knapp, Sophia A............... Winchester, N. H.,..........
Lee, Mary J...................... East Longmeadow, Mass.,
Linnehan, Mary A........... Boston, Mass., ..................
Lovejoy, Lydia A............. Augusta, Me., ..................
Lummis, Delia A............... Pomfret, Conn., ................
Lyons, Ellen....................... Ludlow, Mass., ................
Marks, Sarah C.................Providence, R. I.,.............
Marr, Anna M....................North Washington, Me., .
Martes, Elizabeth.............. Charlestown, Mass.,..........
Mason, Flora S................. Bangor, Me.,......................
Mattson, Elizabeth............ New York City,................
McDonald, Catharine........ Boston, Mass., ..................
McDonough, Elizabeth A.Russell, Mass.,.................
McKay, Mary A............... River Point, R. I., .........
Meacham, Mary O............. Westfield, Mass., ............
Meacham, Morcellia A.. ..Westfield, Mass.,.............
Merrill, Frances J.............. Skowhegan, Me., ..............
Milan, Catharine............... Milford, Mass.,..................
Admission.
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1866
........ Sept., 1866
........ Oct., 1863
.. ..Sept., 1863
.........May, 1864
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept.-, 1863
........Sept., 1863
... .Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1859
........ Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1863
... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1861
—. Sept., 1861
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1861
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1864
... .Nov., 1863
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1867
... .Sept., 1865
........ Oct., 1865
.... Sept., 1866
......... Oct., 1864
....Feb., 1862
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1865
�47
Name.
Residence;
Miller, Catharine W......... Thompsonville, Conn., ...
Monahan, Anna................. Lowell, Mass., ................ .
Moore, Eliza A............... .Derby, Conn., ..................
Moulton, Florette........... Biddeford, Me., ... ...............
Mulcahy, Mary E.............. Salem, Mass.,....................
Munroe, Betsey A............. Rehoboth, Mass.,.............
Murphy, Mary E............... Boston, Mass.,...................
Nichols, Marietta C........... Roxbury, Mass.,............. .
O’Brien, Mary................... East Cambridge, Mass., ..
O’Donnell, Catharine.........Stonington, Conn.,.......... .
O’Hearn, Eliza.................. Tewksbury, Mass., ..........
Peltier, Ella M............... * Cambridge, Mass.,............
.
Prince, Mary E............... Camden, Me.,....................
Perron, Clara.................... Yantic, Conn., ..................
Platt, Sarah E.................... Hinsdale, Mass., ................
Proctor, Emma J............... West Gloucester, Me., ...
Putnam, Almedia M......... Oxford, Me., .....................
Quin, Mary A................... Hartford, Conn.,...............
Richardson, Amelia A.... Mansfield, Mass.,.............
Richardson, Lauretta J... Mansfield, Mass.,..............
Robinson, Hattie J............. Freedom, Me., ..................
Rounds, Sylvia D............... Greene, R. I.,..................
Sanborn, Hester E............. East Wilton, M^e.,.......
Sargent, Lizzie M.............. Concord, N. H.,................
Scoles, Rachel A............... Augusta, Me.,....................
Smith, Mary J................... East Hartford, Conn., ...
Soper, Ella J..................... Lowell, Mass.,...................
Spillane, Mary................... East Boston, Mass.,..........
Stevens, Mary A............... Gloucester, Mass.,............
Stone, Sally E.................. Natick, Mass.,.....................
Stuart, Harriet N............... Wells, Me., .......................
Swett, Persis H................. Henniker, N. JI., ............
Taft, Marion L................... Worcester, Mass.,..............
Talcott, Lillia M................. Bolton, Conn., ................ ..
Teele, Sarah F................... Somerville, Mass.,............ .
Tilton, Ellen L....................Cheshire, Mass.,................
Turner, Lucy M................ South Coventry, Conn., ..
Tisdale, Jennie M............... North Bridgewater, Mass.,
Vincent, Emma A............. South Adams, Mass., ....
Admission.
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1863
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1860
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1863
.... Sept., 1860
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1866
....May, 1862
.... Sept., 1861
.... Oct., 1866
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1853
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1867
... Sept., 1864
... Sept., 1865
... Sept., 1866
.. .Nov., 1865
... Sept., 1867
.. .Sept., 1865
.... Oct., 1867
.... Oct., 1863
... Sept., 1864
.... Oct., 1866
... .Sept., 1862
... Sept., 1864
,... Dec., 1864
... Sept., 1866
... Sept., 1863
�48
Name.
Residence.
Admission.
Walsh, Margaret........... .. .Norwich, Conn., ......... .............. Sept.,
Wentworth, Ella J... . ... Ipswich, «Mass.,............. ............... Sept.,
West, Anna J.............. ... Coventry, R. I.,........... .............. Sept.,
Westgate, Abby.......... ... Warren, R. I.,............. .............. Sept.,
Whitney, Hattie M... ... Gray, Me.,...................... ,............. Sept.,
Willey, Florence H... ... Lockport, N. Y., ......... .............. Sept.,
Wing, Nancy A........... ., .Wayne, Me.,................. ...............Sept.,
York, Mellissa J.......... ... Gilmanton, N. H., .... .............. Sept.,
1866
1866
1857
1864
1867
1866
1867
1864
SUMMARY.
Males.
10
22
8
11
67
- 6
28
3
—
155
Whole number in attendance within the year, Greatest number at any one time,
Average attendance during the year,
-
Females.
Total.
11
21
6
2
45
4
22
0
—
Ill
■
21
43
14
13
112
10
50
3
-
-
-
Supported by Friends, u
Maine,
a
New Hampshire,
u
V ermont,
u
Massachusetts,
a
Rhode Island,
u
Connecticut,
u
New Jersey,
—
-
266
266
229
226
�VI.
COMPOSITIONS.
It is a rule of the school that specimens of composition published in our annual Reports, and
also the letters sent at stated times to the friends of our pupils, shall receive no correction,
except such as their respective authors can make on a careful review when the errors they
contain are pointed out by a teacher.
STORIES.
A lady goes into a store. She buys a pretty box. She carries the box
to her home. She gives the box to her little girl. The girl opens the box.
She finds a doll in it. She is very happy.
Two boys take a large bag. They go to the woods. They see some nuts
on a tree. They throw stones at the nuts. The nuts fall. The boys put
the nuts into the bag. They leave the woods. A dog chases them. They
run. They lose all the nuts.
A girl takes a basket. She puts the basket on her arm. She goes to an
apple tree. She finds some red apples under the tree. She puts the apples
into her basket. She carries the basket into the house. She gives the
apples to her mother. Her mother makes some pies.
Harteord, May 5th, 1868.
My Dear Father and Mother:—I am very well. I am happy. The
Asylum is large. Many boys and girls are here. The boys play ball, the
girls jump rope. I like bread and butter. I like sugar and milk and cof
fee. I write in the school. Mr. S. rides on a white horse. Mr. Clark car
ries Master Clark on his shoulder. I see a lady riding on a white horse.
I am eight years old. Mrs. White gives some stockings out of a drawer to
Master Clark. Mr. Kennedy chases Master Clark. I hide behind a door.
7
�50
I see three little pigs in a barrel. I love my father and my mother. They
are very kind. I hope my father and my mother are well.
I am your affectonate son,
F. H. C.
Lost hearing at two years. In school eight months.
Hartford, May 8th, 1868.
My Dear Father and Mother :—I live in the Asylum. There are some
trees near the Asylum. It is pleasant now. The grass is green. The flow
ers are growing. I like flowers. They are very pretty. In school we write
slates. In the morning I wash my face and comb my hair. I Work in the
shop. I sew shoes. A deaf and dumb girl finds a little pigeon. She car
ries the pigeon into the Asylum. Mrs. White gives some bread to the
pigeon. Mr. Kennedy sees a rat. He calls his dog. The dog chases the
rat and kills it. Mr. S. rides on a white horse. I love my father and my
mother. I send my love to all.
I am your affectionate son,
F. P. B.
Lost hearing at three. In school eight months.
A hunter.
A few years ago a wise man went to the city. He went into a store. He
bought a gun and some powder and shot. He put the powder and shot
into his pocket. He took his gun and put the gun on his shoulder. He
went to a depot. He went into the cars. He went to A. in a steamboat.
He went to a forest. He walked through the woods. He saw a bear on a
large tree. He put the powder and shot into the gun. He loaded the gun
with a ramrod. He shot the bear. The bear fell to the ground. He was
very glad that the bear fell to the ground. He went to the bear. He car
ried the bear to a river and threw it into the river. He went to the woods.
He saw a deer sleeping. He put the powder and shot into the gun. He
loaded the gun with the ramrod. He shot the deer. He went to the deer.
He carried it to the steamboat. He put it on the steamboat. He went
into the steamboat. He went to Boston in the steamboat. He took the
deer out of the steamboat. He put the deer on a wagon. He rode in the
wagon home. He took the deer out of the wagon. He carried it into a
house. He showed the deer to my mother and brother and sister and
father. My brother and sister and mother and father were very glad that
the deer was dead. His wife cooked some venison. My brother and sister
and father and mother liked to eat some venison. He gave the deer to my
father.. My father thanked the wise man. He was very glad that the wise
man gave the deer to my father.
‘yy. p
Lost hearing at 2 years. In school 16 mos.
�51
Stories ok monkeys.
Several years ago a man lived in South America. He made some baskets.
One day he picked them and tied them together. He carried them to the
city and sold them. He got money. He went into another store. He
bought some hats and caps. He started for home. He walked through
the woods. After walking one or two hours, he was very tired. He put
the hats and caps on the ground under a cocoa-nut tree. He lay on the
ground and fell asleep. While he was sleeping some monkeys saw the man
sleeping. The monkeys climbed down the tree and went to him. The
monkeys stole them and took them. The monkeys put them on and
climbed up. When he awoke he looked for his hats and caps. Soon he
saw the monkeys put them on. He was provoked. He shook his fist at
the monkeys. The monkeys shook their fists at the man. He threw some
stones to the monkeys and the monkeys threw cocoa-nuts to the man. He
threw his hat. The monkeys threw the hats and caps on the ground. He
picked them and tied them together. He carried them home and was very
glad to get them.
Many years ago a clergyman lived in England. He had a monkey. One
day he wrote a sermon to prepare for the next day. The monkey came to
him. He told the monkey that it should not go to church. The monkey
told him that it should go to church. The next day he put clean clothes
on and his wife also put clean clothes on. He offered his arm to his wife
and went to church. He told his wife to sit down. He went into the pul
pit. By and by he was warm and rested for a few minutes. He prayed to
God. Many people sang. He preached the sermon. The monkey came
up and sat on the sounding-board over the pulpit. It heard him preaching
the sermon. It saw him making his gestures. It imitated his gestures.
The people saw the monkey on the sounding-board and laughed at it. He
saw the people laughing and asked them why they laughed at him. One
of the people told him that it preached like him. He told his servant to
go up and catch it. So he went up and caught it and carried it home. At
noon the people went away.
M. J. S.
Congenital. In school three years.
A GENEROUS MAN.
Many years ago, there were two students in a College in Athens. One ,
student was named Septimius and he was a native of Rome. The other
student was named Alcander and he was a native of Athens. Alcander
was the most eloquent speaker. Septimius’ was a strong reasoner. Al
cander saw a beautiful lady. Her name was Hypatia. He wished to marry
her. He admired her. He wished to introduce Septimius to Hypatia.
«
�52
*
They visited Septimius and came into the house. The next day Septimius
was very sick with a fever and laid on a bed. Alcander and Hypatia
wished to visit Septimius. But the doctors told them that they should not
go to see Septimius. Alcander understood that Septimius was jealous of
Hypatia. Alcander gave Hypatia to Septimius to marry her. He was
very glad to marry her and the fever left him. He was very well and mar
ried her. They went to Rome. Hypatia’s friends were very angry with
Alcander. They seized him, robbed him of his property. He became a
slave. His master was very cruel to him. Alcander determined to run
away. He ran away and went into caves and slept all day. At last he
came to Rome. Septimius sat in a chair at court. Alcander walked
among many people. Septimius did not know Alcander. In the night
he took anum and went into the cave. He fell into a sound sleep.
Two robbers came near Alcander and quarrelled about some plunder.
One robber killed the other. He lay bleeding on the ground. The other
robber ran away. Many people saw the dead man near Alcander. They
seized Alcander and brought him into the court. They showed him to
Septimius. He found that Alcander was guilty. Septimius was going to
sentence him, when Septimius knew Alcander and kissed him. Many
people were surprised to see him. He went home with Alcander. The
other robber was found and sentenced.
R. A. S.
Lost hearing at two. In school four years.
AUTOBIOGRAPHY.
My name is Gertie Robin. Early this spring I built a new nest in the
branches of a tall ever-green tree, and I began to live in it, in the state of
Vermont. I am very glad to live in my new nest in safety. I always make
a nest in the country every spring, because it is pleasanter in the country
than in the city. I would be afraid of many bad boys in the city. I am
sorry that I begin to be old, and am tired of flying around the trees all
day. I often fly to my nest and sit in it and rest and sing sweetly. I am
proud that I sing sweetly. When I am hungry, I fly and get some worms
and eat them and then I sit in my nest again. Last summer I had four
little eggs in my nest and I sat on them a long time. In a few weeks they
hatched and I had four little birds. Then I flew away to get some worms
for them, and I fed them to my young ones. In the evening I put my
young ones in my nest and they slept under my wings and they were warm
enough because I have many feathers on my body. In a few weeks I
taught them how to fly and then they flew away, and I missed them very
much. How foolish I was to teach them to fly. But I lived with them
again in South Carolina, which is a warm country. We all went there last
Fall. They do not live near me now. I told them that I must make a
new nest here this spring. Perhaps I shall have four more eggs by and by.
�53
I shall be glad to have some new young ones. But I almost died yester
day. I happened to sit on the fence in the garden. How careless I was I
A wild grey cat came near me and caught me, but I pecked his head with
my sharp bill and he was afraid and I flew away. By and by I shall fly
away to South Carolina again and I shall see my friends. They will be
very glad to see me. I shall ask them “ Do you wish me to tell you about
the North?” They will say “Yes.” Then I shall tell them about the
grey cat. I shall be very happy to see them again. I am very proud be
cause I have two black and beautiful eyes. I am proud because you ad
mire me. Will you please to give me some crumbs of bread, and I will
sing to you.
G. A. E.
Congenital. In school three years.
DREAMS.
Our dreams are not sure and they do not tell us truly—But they are
sometimes funny. Our Heavenly Father, who is very wise and good,
makes us dream. It is very wonderful. I suppose our souls go out of our
bodies and work and travel, as we do, while we are lying on our beds at
night. We do not know what our dreams will be, and we cannot stop the
dreams because God makes us dream steadily. Our dreams tell us many
lies and many funny stories in the night. I will tell you some of my
dreams. About a month ago I dreamed that it snowed very much, so that
it was very deep, and I took my books in a little leather bag, and put on a
pair of my Father’s boots and bade my family good-bye and said to them
that I was going to school on the top of the snow. While I was walking,
I saw a large bear following me. I tried to walk very fast, but I fell many
times for I dreamed that the road was perpendicular, so that the bear
caught me and bit my body. I screamed very loudly, and my Father
heard me and shot the bear. By and by I awaked and my dream was aw
ful. I would like to dream my own dreams.
About a year ago I dreamed that many letters were in my bureau, and I
was very glad to get them but I awaked and found that my handkerchief
was in my hand, it seemed to be a letter. I was disappointed. Last
night I dreamed that I was walking along the bridge near my home and
met my friends. They were all surprised for I told them that Mr. S. had
expelled me, but I awaked and I was here in my bed. I was very glad. If
x Mr. S. should expel me truly, I should be very much ashamed.
MY WISH.
If I could have my wish, I would be a book. I would be a very large
book:—larger than these books. I would not be printed, but I would be
created, and would put language on it myself. I would never be worn out.
�54
If any person did hot take care of me, and keep me clean, I would not al
low him to read me. I would run to the good people and let them read
me always. I would be one of the wise books, and would cause the people
to admire me for my language which would be very simple and good. I
would be very useful, and would not want to have any person dislike to
read me. I would walk to people and speak my language, so that they
could hear me. I would shut myself when they had done reading me. I
would have one trillion of pages so that the people would never finish
reading me. I would not want to be on a shelf, but I would be on a table.
If any person forgot me, I would follow him, and walk with him, for I
would not want to be put in a trunk. I would never want to eat nor
drinkK but I would breathe and walk with people. I would want to have
people believe me, that I always tell them truly about everything which
happens in ancient or modern times. I would wish to live one thousand
years. I would want to go to heaven. I would not want to have any fable
books go to heaven. I would let the Bible go to heaven, because it always
tells the people truly about important things. Before I died, I would go
up and down, and would tell every person that this was the last time to
read me. I would let good persons go with me to heaven and read me in
heaven.
P. S.
Congenital. In School five years.
A WEDDING.
One day a bird whose name was Jenny Wren, stood on a tree. A bird
whose name was Cock Robin, came to her. He said to her “ Please may I
marry you ? ” She said “Yes.” Robin flew away and bought a yellow
dress for Wren. He came to Wren’s house and knocked at the door. She
went to the door and opened it. She led him to the parlor and he sat by
the window and told her that he had brought a yellow dress to her. She
blushed behind her fan. He went away and met Lark and Sparrow and
said to them “please come to see me this afternoon for I shall be married.”
They told many birds. Rook, who was a preacher walked with Jenny
Wren. Many birds came to their wedding party. Rook said to Robin
“Will you marry Wren?” Jenny Wren sung very sweetly. Robin mar
ried her and they were happy. They went to their house. Some birds
were on the tree and sung to honor Robin and Wren. Robin and Wren
ate cherry pies which were very sweet. After supper, they walked in the
woods. Sparrow was jealous of them. He had his arrows and bows and
shot Robin so that he died. Jenny Wren wept for him. She pulled the
arrow from his heart. When the birds heard that Robin was dead, they
mourned. They carried him to his house and put him in a beautiful coflin
and had a funeral. Then they caught Sparrow and hanged him. Poor
Widow Jenny Wren.
E. H.
Lost hearing at two and a half years. In school five years.
�55
MY WISH.
If I could have my wish, I would be a noble oak tree. Yes ! Such as
shelters the weary traveller from the mid-day sun. Such as the weary cat
tle find rest under, and such a tree as is honored above all trees. I would,
on first coming into the world, be a small shoot, not one-third as thick as
my little finger, then I would grow on year by year until I became in gen
eral sense a tree, but only a quarter the size I intended to be. I should not
be much thought of until I had lived about one generation, then I should
begin to be honored. The oldest inhabitants, would tell their children and
grand-children of my life, of my nobleness, and how often they had
played under me in their youth, and fastened their swings to my thick
branches. Now they being too old to enjoy such things, should still love
to sit under me, and watch the young children play. Yes ! I should often
bring tears to their eyes, when I reminded them of their happy youth. I
would in summer clothe my branches with the thickest and greenest of fol
iage, and in winter give my greatest strength to my limbs, to help them
bear the stormy winds and heavy snow and ice. I should learn to bear the
cold winds and storms which would beat against me. I would learn to
bear them all as a young man his temptations, a Christian his difficulties.
I would show myself so proud and noble that every one would say “ Noble
oak! honored above all.”—Yes ! I would do all this and more; I would
show still greater ambition. I would spread forth my branches to the
North, to the South, to the East and to the West. I would outgrow all
the other trees in height, thickness and strength. I would grow on until
no body knew how old I was. I would be the grand old oak which could
bear a hurricane. I would be so great and fine that all who knew my age
and nobleness would say—“ woodman! spare that tree.” I would be the
noble oak under which many had told their tales of love, and confessed
their broken vows. Under which merry children had played and the aged
had rested their limbs weary with cares. The tree which birds could build
their nests in with out fear. The largest birds should rest upon me and build
their nests in my branches. I would spread my root out in the earth a great
distance. I would tell all the other trees, who had not lived half my age
of the past generations, of their frivolous fashions, their modes of living and
of their goodness and wickedness. I would teach them all to be good and
noble, and to shun all evil. None should want for shelter from the raging
blast or the scorching heat while I lived. I would do wonders if I was an
oak tree—such wonders as an oak has never been known to do before and
never will do hereafter.
C. D.
ASTRONOMY.
t
No one can look at the heavenly bodies through a powerful telescope,
without experiencing feelings of mingled wonder and awe. To the naked
�56
eye, the stars appear to be but mere specks dotted here and there in the
blue canopy far above us. Considering the immense distance of the stars
from the earth, it seems almost incredible that they can shine with such
brilliancy. But the stars are not in reality the insignificant objects that
they appear to be. When viewed through telescopes they are seen to be
very large bodies.
The planet Jupiter is said to be a thousand times larger than the earth,
and consequently is of great size. The earth itself is but a mere atom in
comparison with the enormous size of the sun. It has been proved to be a
million times smaller. A pinhead placed by the side of a large ball, would
be a good illustration of the different sizes of the sun and earth.
With the aid of large refracting telescopes and other powerful instru
ments the stars and heavenly bodies have been examined and studied. The
results of these observations arb truly wonderful, instead of the few thou
sand stars visible to the naked eye many millions can be discerned. The
faint misty specks resembling fog seen among the constellations are discov
ered to be composed of innumerable stars, very small in appeararance and
close together. The numerous stars called “ Double Stars” which are so
near to each other that to the naked eye they seem as one star are seen by
the telescope to be separated by immense distances.
By close inspection spots have been discovered on the surface of the sun
much larger than the earth. The light and heat which appear to us to
come directly from the sun do in fact proceed from self-luminous clouds
far above its body. These clouds bestow upon the earth more heat in sum
mer than in winter. This arises from the fact that the North pole of the
earth is turned towards the sun in the summer months and is turned away
from it in winter. Consequently this not only allows us longer days but
gives us more heat in summer than in winter. The sun which is really a
star, appears to move in a vast circle around the earth. But the earth in
reality turns about on an axis and completes a rotation in a day and night.
The sun is attended on its course by a system of planets. The planets are
movable stars which revolve around the sun, but the fixed stars are sup
posed to be suns which bestow upon other planetary systems the genial in
fluences of their light and heat.
Some of the planets shine with great splendor and brilliancy. There are
eight planets of which Venus and Jupiter are the brightest and most beau
tiful. These two planets are the most conspicuous of the whole planetary
system. The planet Saturn shines with a dull pale light, and-is of a dull
red color. Around Saturn and wholly detached from the body of the
planet, is a vast luminous ring, many thousands of miles in diameter.
When we consider the enormous size of Jupiter we are filled with great
wonder. It is difficult and perhaps absolutely impossible to realize the
fact of one of the stars being larger or even as large as the earth. Venus
which is the most beautiful planet in the whole heavens, is a little smaller
than the earth and can easily be discerned with the naked eye.
�57
Upon the surface of the planet Mars, large bodies of water and continents
have been discovered. The bright beautiful moon, by whose generous
light we are enabled to distinguish objects by night, though appealing no
larger than a ball, is of great size and has been discovered to contain
numerous mountains, by which its surface is much diversified.
The light and heat which the sun and other heavenly bodies bestow upon
the earth, furnishes a striking illustration of the goodness and benevolence
of our blessed Creator.
W. L. H.
IS IT RIGHT TO MARRY FOR MONEY ?
\Scene I.—A young lady's boudoir in a handsome mansion.—Afternoon.—
Lily seated in a deep bay window, embroidering.—Enters her intimatefriend
Mabel, in a high state of excitement.']
Mabel. Oh Lily! I have the greatest little piece of news to tell you.
The beautiful Miss M. is going to be married to that horrid Mr. T. and
nearly all the fashionable world is at the height of excitement, and only
think, there is a whisper that it is all for money!
Lily. Mabel! for money ! did you say it is all for money ? Well, it is
very foolish to marry for money. Isn’t it so, ma chere ?
M. Ah ! my dear, I am sorry to say I must differ with you in this. I
am in favor of marrying for money, provided the man is old and of a weak
constitution, and not likely to survive long !
L. Why, Mabel, for shame! How heartless you have grown—you who
used to have such romantic notions when at school. What has caused such
a change in you, darling ?
M. My dear girl, I have learned that such a thing as love, is well enough
for a brief time, but when you come to real life, you will find that it is a
different thing. How absurd it is to think of such a thing as love in a cot
tage, without the means to procure the common conveniences of life. Such
billing and cooing will do well enough for the sentimental,
“ But give me a sly flirtation,
By the light of a chandelier,
With music to play in the pauses,
And nobody very near.”
L. Indeed you are greatly mistaken about love. You talk as if you
never felt the pangs of true love. But if you knew what love was, you
could not help echoing my words: “ How sweet it is to love and to be
loved.”
\Enter a servant bea/ring a silver tra/y with a perfumed note for Lily.]
M. (Eagerly) is it from Miss M. ?
L. (Reading.) Oui, ma aime.
M. What does she say ?
L. She asks the favor of my company at her wedding.
8
�58
Jf. Shall you not go, my darling ?
L. No, dear, I must decline it, as I do not want to see her take upon
herself the burden of future misery, as I know this marriage will produce.
Jf. Well, then, my dear, I must go without you. You have such queer
ideas about marriage. Good evening.
[Exit Mabel.]
Scene II.—same room—five months after the wedding.
L. Now, Ma chere, hear what I am going to say. Well, I heard a rumor
that Mrs. T. is very unhappy and miserable because of her husband, who is
getting cross and unlovable as he is getting older every day, though he will
probably live many years, for he has such a strong constitution. What is
your opinion of marrying for money now ? [with a sneer.]
I am really sorry if it is true, but notwithstanding it has not yet
weakened my faith in money. Mrs. T. who was present at the late grand
ball at Music Hall, looked as happy as any one in the room ! besides she was
covered with jewels the gifts of her devoted lord. I am sure I did not see
the least traces of grief or misery upon her face. I think the rumor must
have been false.
L. But if you could see behind the curtain, you would think differently.
I suppose “ to keep up appearances” is her motto. I do really pity her, but
she knew better when $he sold herself for money.
Scene III.—five months later—Mabel and Lily driving down Fifth ave
nue.
L. Now, Mabel, did you see Mrs T. just now, in her splendid mansion,
flattening her nose against the window of the drawing room, with such a
despairing look—such a wild longing in her eye, that I know she has not
lived a happy life, in spite of wealth which could buy anything she wished.
The riches which she thought would buy happiness, are like the apples of
Sodom. Mabel, what do you think of marrying for money ?
M. hlLy dearest girl, I must confess that I have made a fatal mistake in
thinking that money without love can give happiness. According to Mrs.
T.’s confession which she made to me a few days ago, she says money, with
out love, is the source of the greatest unhappiness. She says that she would
rather be the wife of a poor man whom she loved, than the rich man’s dar
ling whom she hates. Therefore I hope we shall never be so foolish as to
marry for money.
Lily, E. D. C.
Mabel, M. A. McK.
�TERMS OF ADMISSION.
I. The Asylum will provide for each pupil, board, lodging and washing,
the continual superintendence of health, conduct, manners and morals, fuel,
lights, stationery and other incidental expenses of the school-room; for
which, including tuition, there will be an annual charge of one hundred
;and seventy-five dollars.
II. In case of sickness, the necessary extra charges will be made.
III. No deduction from the above charge will be made on account of
vacation or absence, except in case 01 sickness.
IV. Payments are always to be made six months in advance, for the
punctual fulfillment of which, a satisfactory bond will be required.
V. Each person applying for admission, must be between the ages of
eight and twenty-five years; must be of a good natural intellect; ca
pable of forming and joining letters with a pen, legibly and correctly; free
from any immoralities of conduct, and from any contagious disease.
Applications for the benefit of the legislative appropriations in the States
of Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, should be made to the Sec
retaries of those States respectively, stating the name and age of the pro
posed beneficiary, and the circumstances of his parent or guardian. Ap
plications as above should be made in Vermont, Rhode Island and Con
necticut, respectively, to his Excellency, the Governor of the State. In all
cases, a certificate from two or more of the selectmen, magistrates, or other
respectable inhabitants of the township or place to which the applicant
belongs, should accompany the application.
Those applying for the admission of pa/ying pupils, may address their
letters to the Principal of the Asylum; and on all letters from him respect
ing the pupils, postage will be charged.
The time for admitting pupils is the second Wednesday of September, and
at no other time in the year. Punctuality in this respect is very import
ant, as it cannot be expected that the progress of a whole class should be
retarded on account of a pupil who joins it after its formation. Such a
pupil must suffer the inconvenience and the loss.
�60
It is earnestly recommended to the friends of the deaf and dumb, to have
them taught to write a fair and legible hand before they come to the
Asylum. This can be easily done, and it prepares them to make greater
and more rapid improvement.
When a pupil is sent to the Asylum, unless accompanied by a parent or
some friend who can give the necessary information concerning him, he
should bring a written statement embracing specifically the following par
ticulars :
1. The name, in full.
2. Post office address, and correspondent.
3. Day, month and year of birth.
4. Cause of deafness.
5. Names of the parents.
6. Names of the children in the order of their age.
7. Were the parents related before marriage ? If so, how ?
8. Has the pupil deaf-mute relatives ? If so, what ?
The pupil should be well-clothed; that is, he should have both summer
and winter clothing enough to last one year, and be furnished with a list of
the various articles, each of which should be marked. A small sum of
money should also be deposited with the Steward of the Asylum, for the
personal expenses of the pupil not otherwise provided for.
Careful attention to these suggestions is quite important.
There is but one vacation in the year. It begins on the last Wednesday
of June, and closes on the second Wednesday of September. It is expected
that the pupils will spend the vacation at home. This arrangement is as
desirable for the benefit of the pupils, who need the recreation and change
of scene, as for the convenience of the Institution, thus affording opportu
nity for the necessary painting, cleansing, &c. The present facilities for
travel, enable most of the pupils to reach home on the evening of the day
they leave Hartford. Every pupil is expected to return punctually at the
opening of school, on the second Wednesday of September.
On the day of the commencement of the Vacation, an officer of the
Asylum will accompany such pupils as are to travel upon the railroads be
tween Hartford and Boston, taking care of them and their Baggage, on
condition that their friends will make timely provison for their expenses on
the way, and engage to meet and i eceive them immediately on the arrival
of the early train at various points on the route previously agreed on, and
at the station of the Boston and Worcester Railroad, in Boston. A similar
arrangement is made on the Connecticut River Railroads, as far as to
White River Junction. No person will be sent from the Asylum to accom
pany the pupils on their return, but if their fare is paid, and their trunks
checked to Hartford, it will be safe to send them in charge of the Con
ductor.
�
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
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Title
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The fifty-second annual report of the directors and officers of the American asylum at Hartford for the education and instruction of the deaf and dumb
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
American Asylum at Hartford for the Deaf and Dumb
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Hartford, Conn.
Collation: 60 p. : ill ; 23 cm.
Notes: With illustration of the building and the deaf and dumb alphabet. Contains list of pupils. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
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Wiley, Waterman & Eaton
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1868
Identifier
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G5186
Subject
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Disability
Education
Rights
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The fifty-second annual report of the directors and officers of the American asylum at Hartford for the education and instruction of the deaf and dumb), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Deafness
Education
Muteness
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/886b0dee9bfe1d02569e9288a73f0ec6.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=dgw1MybP7H%7EYFeQrGrlE6SDD0bqGX9je3-n6NTD1Sj8SSfE193K6Q1SniYGOo63-4-s-2pwCs0c9W%7EiNZz4K0S%7EYY%7EEB6KRSx-6Nm9LcbEN-U0z2psECq6Th5VpLaDSoNmS8kkYufzPiCOG78JX50NK7ADFSUka81iT6yKtF6WRWUJjLzUDat2ixzxDpR8gzFv-qBU18mT890aM1WLzcMfZrNy7Ih0ecB-QV5aZ68zloNJAAdwJ%7Etwg9VXqERt5O7hBliw-W5mDYVtx6mn3ZSRGoood2hEZV5VWey2eornAGTKr8puuGzwDvy%7EcsdOcc44cbHSJwkxJPt0QfboGiYA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
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Text
T 'JET K/
CORNELL UNIVERSITY
AT ITHACA, N. Y.
FIRST GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENT.
TRUSTEES.
*His Excellency, REUBEN E. FENTON, Governor.
*His Honor STEWART L. WOODFORD, Lieutenant-Governor.
*Hon. WILLIAM HITCHMAN, Speaker.
*Hon. THOMAS H. FAILE, President State Agricultural Society
*Hon. VICTOR M. RICE, Superintendent of Public Instruction.
*Hon. EZRA CORNELL, Chairman of Board of Trustees.
*Hon. ANDREW D. WHITE, President of the University.
*FRANCIS M. FINCH, Esq., Librarian Cornell Public Libra/ry.
*ALONZO B. CORNELL, Esq., Ithaca.
Hon. HORACE GREELEY, New York.
Hon. EDWIN D. MORGAN, New York.
Hon. ERASTUS BROOKS,k New York.
Hon. WILLIAM KELLY, Rhinebeck.
Gen. J. MEREDITH READ, Albany.
Hon. GEORGE H. ANDREWS, Springfield, Otsego Co.
Hon. ABRAM B. WEAVER, Deerfield, Onf.tda Co.
Hon. CHARLES J. FOLGER, Geneva.
Hon. EDWIN B. MORGAN, Aurora.
Hon. JOHN M. PARKER, Owego.
*
HIRAM SIBLEY, Esq., Rochester.
Hon. JOSIAH B. WILLIAMS, Ithaca.
Hon. GEORGE W. SCHUYLER, Ithaca, Treas.ofthe University,
WILLIAM ANDRUS, Esq., Ithaca.
JOHN McGRAW, Esq., Ithaca.
* Trustees Ex Officio.
��RESIDENT PROFESSORS.
HON. ANDREW D. WHITE, EL. D.,
PRESIDENT AND PROP. OP HISTORY.
EVAN W. EVANS, M. A.,
PROP. OF MATHEMATICS.
WILLIAM CHANNING RUSSELL, M. A.,
PROP. OF SOUTH EUROPEAN LANGUAGES AND ASSOCIATE PROF. OF HISTORY.
ELI WHITNEY BLAKE, M. A., PH. D.,
PROF. OF PHYSICS AND INDUSTRIAL MECHANICS.
GEORGE C. CALDWELL, M. S., PH. D.,
PROF. OP AGRICULTURAL CHEMISTRY.
JAMES M. CRAFTS, M. S., PH. D.t
PROF. OF GENERAL AND ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY.
BURT G. WILDER, M. D.,
PROF. OF COMPARATIVE ANATOMY AND NATURAL HISTORY.
JOSEPH HARRIS,
PROF. OF PRACTICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL AGRICULTURE.
Major JOSEPH H. WHITTLESEY (U. S. Army),
PROF. OF MILITARY SCIENCE.
LEBBEUS H. MITCHELL, B. A., PH. D.,
PROF. OF MINING AND METALLURGY.
DANIEL WILLARD FISKE, M. A., PH. D.,
PROF. OF NORTH EUROPEAN LANGUAGES AND LIBRARIAN.
The following are to be elected in July and September.
PROF. OF MORAL AND INTELLECTUAL PHILOSOPHY.
PROF. OF GENERAL, ECONOMIC AND AGRICULTURAL GEOLOGY.
PROF. OF CIVIL ENGINEERING.
PROF. OF ANCIENT LANGUAGES.
*
�4
FACULTY.
PROF. OF BOTANY, HORTICULTURE AND ARBORICULTURE.
PROF. OF RHETORIC, ORATORY AND VOCAL CULTURE
NON-RESIDENT PROFESSORS AND LECTURERS.
LOUIS AGASSIZ, LL. D.,
prof, of natural history
.
(20 Lectures).
Hon. FREDERICK HOLBROOK, LL. D.,
PROF. OF MECHANICS APPLIED TO AGRICULTURE (12 Lectures)
JAMES HALL, LL. D.,
PROF. OF GENERAL GEOLOGY (12 Lectures).
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL, M. A.,
PROF. OF ENGLISH LITERATURE
(12 Lectures).
Hon. GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS, M. A.,
PROF. OF RECENT LITERATURE
(12 Lectures).
Hon. THEODORE W. DWIGHT, LL. D.
PROF. OF CONSTITUTIONAL LAW AND LECTURER ON THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED
states
(13 Lectures).
The following are to be elected at an early day.
PROF. OF POLITICAL ECONOMY.
PROF. OF RURAL ECONOMY AND ARCHITECTURE.
PROF. OF AMERICAN HISTORY.
PROF. OF VETERINARY SURGERY AND BREEDING OF ANIMALS.
PROF. OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY AND LECTURER ON INSECTS INJURIOUS TO VEGETATION.
S
*
>
�CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
FIRST GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENT.
The first term of the Cornell University, at Ithaca, N. Y.,
will open on the last Wednesday in September, 1868, with the
inauguration of’ the President and Professors.
The examination of candidates for admission will be con
ducted by the Professors elect in the several departments, on
the Monday and Tuesday preceding.
Though students can be received at a later period, it is
greatly desired that they appear on Monday and Tuesday as
above.
The organization of Divisions, Departments, Courses and
Classes will immediately follow the inauguration exercises, and
there will be no delay in the commencement of instruction.
All instruction at the University will be comprehended
under two Divisions.
I. The Division of Special Sciences and Arts.
II. The Division of Science, Literature, and the Arts in
GENERAL.
Departments and Courses, in these two Divisions, will be
organized as follows:
I. DIVISION OF SPECIAL SCIENCES AND ARTS.
1. The Department of Agriculture.
2.
“
“
The Mechanic Arts.
3.
“
“
Civil Engineering.
4.
“
“
Military Engineering and Tactics.
5.
“
“
Mining and Practical Geology.
6.
“
“
History, Social and Political Science.
�6
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
In all the instruction in these Departments a constant effort
will be made to educate men to speedily become practically
useful in developing the resources and in aiding in the general
progress of the country.
In the DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, science and
practice will go together, not to rear a body of amateur agri
culturists, but to bring scientific methods to bear in ordinary
agriculture, so that, tried by an economic test, the result shall be
to advance the prosperity of the country. Special attention
will be given to the education of young men, ambitious to
become instructors and professors in the numerous agricultural
colleges now rising in nearly all the States of the Union.
In the DEPARTMENT OF THE “ MECHANIC ARTS,”
science will also be applied to practice, fitting men to take
positions of influence and usefulness, in developing the manu
facturing and mechanical resources and interests of the country.
Special attention will be paid to the practical education of
those who wish to take charge of manufactories and work-shops
of various sorts.
In the DEPARTMENT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING the
same idea of making thoroughly scientific men for speedy prac
tical use will be carried out.
The DEPARTMENT OF MILITARY ENGINEERING
AND TACTICS is placed under the supervision of graduates
of the National Academy at West Point.
The DEPARTMENT OF MINING AND PRACTICAL
GEOLOGY has for its aim the fitting of men to develop the
vast mineral resources of the nation. When it is considered
* what immense losses have been incurred under the manage
ment of unscientific or half-scientific men, the importance of
this Department will be recognized. Situated, as the Univer
sity is, near one of the greatest mining districts of the United
States, it presents special attractions to all students desiring
real preparation for work of the kind contemplated.
In the DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY, SOCIAL AND
POLITICAL SCIENCE, the need of the country for a higher
and more thorough education for the public service, will be
�THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
7
constantly kept in view. Principles, as thought out hy Econo
mists, Statesmen and Historians, will be constantly applied to
what has been actually wrought out in society. The trustees
will endeavor, in questions of Political Economy, upon which
good and able men differ, to have both sides ably presented and
discussed. No attempt will be made, however, to proselyte
students to any peculiar or partisan views.
II. DIVISION OF SCIENCE, LITERATURE, AND TILE
ARTS IN GENERAL.
1. First General Course, or “Modern Course.”
This will extend through four years. To Modern Languages,
which have become so indispensable in a good education,
will be mainly assigned the place and labor usually given to
Ancient Languages. The course will be suited to the needs of
students, so far as possible, by the allowance of options-between
studies in the latter years of the course, on a plan somewhat
similar to that lately adopted at Harvard University.
2. “Modern Course Abridged.”
This course will extend through three years. This, as well
as the abridged courses which follow, are intended to meet the
needs of those students who have not time for a full general
course. It will give the main studies of the extended course,
the subordinate studies being omitted so as to decrease the time
one year.
3. Second General Course, or “ Combined Course.”
This course will extend through four years. In this the lan
guages studied will be Latin and German, the remainder of the
course being essentially the same as the “ General Course.” To
those who wish to make a thorough study of Modern Languages
this course will be valuable, as combining the most useful parts,
practically, of the courses usually pursued in Colleges, with a
broader course; giving the two sides of all the great Modern
Languages and literatures, including our own, and aiding the
�8
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
scientific student greatly in the literature and nomenclature of
science.
4. “ Combined Course Abridged.”
This wifi extend through three years.
character.
Its name explains its
5. Third General Course, or “ Classical Course.”
This will be mainly like the “First General Course,” with
the option of Ancient Languages for Modern. While making
full provision, in other courses, for Scientific instruction, full
attention will be given, in this course, to Classical instruction.
The aim will constantly be to provide a Classical Course, as
full and thorough as that of any College in the land—to make,
not smatterers, but sound classical scholars; to strengthen the
student, by giving him an insight into the great thoughts of
great thinkers—not to burden his mind with scraps of doubtful
philosophy and second-hand pedantry.
6. “ Scientific Course.”
This will extend through three years, affording a general
scientific preparation for either of the first four departments in
the “ First Division,” as named above. A special effort will be
made to bring this department fully up to the needs of the
times, both by the course adopted and by the professors elected
to maintain it.
7. Scientific Course Abridged.
This will extend through two years. Its name explains its
character.
8. Optional Course.
This is similar to that allowed American students in the
greater German Universities; also like the “Select Course” at
the University of Michigan ; and which, in both cases, has been
very successful. In this course the student, on consultation
with friends and the appropriate instructors, selects any three
studies for which he may be fitted, from the whole range of
studies pursued in .the entire University, follows them up to
*
�THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
9
such a point as may be agreed upon, and receives, from the
Governing Board of the University, at the completion of his
work, a certificate, showing the extent of the course he has
taken.
9. Degrees, Diplomas and Certificates.
Appropriate degrees, attested by diplomas or certificates, wiii
be conferred upon all students passing satisfactorily through
any of the above named departments or courses. But it is
thoroughly to be understood that no distinction will be made
between the courses extending through four years, as to the
name, character or value of the degree or diploma, and the
trustees pledge themselves to use every effort to prevent any
caste-spirit in any department or course as compared with
another. It is intended to confer the degree of A. B. (Bachelor
of Arts) on all students wTho shall have satisfactorily passed
either of the above courses, requiring four years of study.
It is intended to confer the degree of B. S. (Bachelor of Science)
on all students passing through the “ Scientific Course” (No. 6),
requiring three years of study.
REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION.
General Requirements. ’
All candidates for admission to any department or course
must present satisfactory evidences of good moral character.
All candidates for admission to any of the special depart
ments in the “First Division ” must be at least sixteen years
of age. All candidates for admission to any of the courses of
the “ Second Division ” must be at least fifteen years of age.
Candidates for advanced standing will be examined in the
previous studies of the course which they purpose to enter, and
if they come from another College or University will present
certificates of honorable dismission.
Entering the University will be considered a pledge to obey
its rules and regulations.
Candidates for admission to any department or course must
have received a good common English education, and be
2
�10
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
morally, mentally and physically qualified to pursue to advan
tage the course of study to which they purpose to give their
attention.*
Special Requirements.
Department oe Civil Engineering- and Archi
Military Engineering and Tactics, and Mining and
Practical Geology. In addition to the general requirements,
candidates will be examined in the whole of Elementary and
Plane Geometry.
2. For the “ Combined Course ” in the Second Division, in
which Latin is taken as an optional study in place of one of
the Modern Languages, in addition to the general require
ments the candidate will be examined in Caesar’s Commen
taries, Cicero’s Select Orations, six books of the EEneid and
forty-five exercises in Arnold’s Prose Composition, or in a
course equivalent to this.
3. For the “ Third General Course,” or “ Classical
Course,” an examination will be made similar to that for enter
ing the first year at the existing Colleges of a good grade.
1. In
the
tecture,
Of Candidates Imperfectly Prepared.
For candidates* found to be of good mental quality, but
defective in preparation, provision will be made for special pre
paratory instruction in a department separate and distinct, but
under the control and direction of the University Faculty,
until such students are fully competent to enter the University.
Students intending to enter are urged to give their main atten
tion, from the time of receiving this circular, to strengthening
themselves in a “sound, ordinary English education
such
as can be obtained in every good public school or academy.
Let their efforts be laid out in perfecting themselves in the
following course:
In English Grammar, the general practical principles, with
the strictest attention to exercises in Orthography. In En* The same qualifications as those named for the Lawrence Scientific School at Cam
bridge.
�THU CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
11
glisli composition each applicant should take pains to cultivate
skill and facility. To this end frequent and brief essays and
»imprCMnptu compositions, oral and written, are recommended.
In Geography, the leading facts of General Geography, with
special attention to the Geography of Europe and America, to
be learned, not by ‘"parroting” from text books, but by com
mon-sense study of any atlas, taking one map after another,
fastening into the mind the leading, physical and political
features in the Geography of each continent and of each
country, and finally grouping them mentally together. To
this end map drawing will be found of the greatest use. Three
weeks’ study, in this way, will do more than “ three years’ ”
study after the ordinary method. In Arithmetic, attention
should be especially directed to fundamental principles. These
should be clearly apprehended, and fairly fixed in the student’s
mind. In view of the course to be pursued in the University,
too much importance cannot be given to a thorough prelimi
nary drill in Mental Arithmetic.
Good health, good habits, and a good thorough education in
the common English branches, are then the simple requirements
for admission. Every failure in institutions for higher educa
tion may be traced to a defect in one of these respects. On
these, as a basis, the University pledges itself to build a good
superstructure.
Fees eor Tuition.
The fees for tuition to persons not exempt under the charter
as “ State Students,” are ten dollars for each term, or thirty
dollars for the year. Neither matriculation fees nor initiation
fees are required.
In special cases of students of decided merit, who are proven
to be in great need, a remission will be made, either wholly or
in part, of tuition fees, such remission being considered as a
loan, the student giving a note or promise to pay them so soon
as he shall become able after leaving the University. In all
other cases payment for each terra must be made in advance.
Students will be held responsible for any injury which mav be
done by them to the University property.
�12
* Payments
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
for
Materials
used in
Laboratory Practice.
Chemicals and other materials used in laboratory practice
will be charged to the student using them at actual cost price.
“ State Students.”
In the original act of incorporation of the University is the
following section:
“ § 9. The several departments of study in the said Univer
sity shall be open to applicants for admission thereto at the
lowest rates of expense consistent with its welfare and effi
ciency, and without distinction as to rank, class, previous
occupation or locality. But, with a view to equalize its advan
tages to all parts of the State, the institution shall annually
receive students, one from each Assembly District in the State,
to be selected as hereinafter provided, and shall give them
instruction in any or in all the prescribed branches of study in
any department of said institution, free of any tuition fee, or
of any incidental charges, to be paid to said University, unless
such incidental charges shall have been made to compensate
for damages needlessly or purposely done by the students to
the property of said University. The said free instruction shall
moreover be accorded to said students in consideration of their
superior ability, and as a reward for superior scholarship in the
academies and public schools of this State. Said students shall
be selected as the Legislature may, from time to time, direct,
and until otherwise ordered, as follows: The School Commis
sioner or Commissioners of each county, and the Board of
Education of each city, or those performing the duties of such
a board, shall select annually the best scholar from each acad
emy and each public school of their respective counties or
cities as candidates for the University scholarship. The candi
dates thus selected in each county or city shall meet at such
time and place in the year as the Board of Supervisors of the
county shall appoint, to be examined by a board consisting of
the School Commissioner or Commissioners of the county, or
by the said Board of Education of the cities, with such other
persons as the Supervisors shall appoint, who shall examine
said candidates and determine which of them are the best
scholars; and the Board of Supervisors shall then select there
from to the number of one for each assembly district in said
county or city, and furnish the candidates thus selected with a
certificate of such selection, which certificate shall entitle said
student to admission to said University, subject to the examina
�THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
13
tion and approval of the Faculty of said University. In
making these selections, preference shall be given (where other
qualifications are equal) to the sons of those who have died in
the military or naval service of the United States; considera
tion shall be had also of the physical ability of the candidate.
Whenever any student selected as above described shall have
been, from any cause, removed from the University before the
expiration of the time for which he was selected, then one of
the competitors to his place in the University from his district
may be elected to succeed him therein, as the School Commis
sioner or Commissioners of the county of his residence, or the
Board of Education of the city of his residence, may direct.”
Under this the Superintendent of Public Instruction will, at
an early day, issue a circular defining the duties of School
Commissioners regarding the examinations under this act, and
making suggestions as to the best manner of conducting them.
All students presenting themselves at the University with a
certificate, such as is contemplated in the section above cited,
showing that after an examination he has been adjudged the
“ best scholar,” will be admitted to any department or course
for which he is fitted, and continue for four years, or as long
as he shall profitably employ his time in the University, free
of all matriculation fees, term taxes, or any other payment for
tuition.
Booms.
Suites of rooms will be provided, in the College buildings
and near the grounds, sufficient for the accommodation of
about two hundred students. Each suite in the buildings con
sists of a study with bedrooms and closets adjoining. They
are large and convenient, with careful provision for heat and
ventilation, and no study or bedroom has been or will be con
structed without direct communication with the outer light
and air.
It is intended, at the expense of the University to provide
neat and durable furniture. The rent of rooms and furniture
will range from sixty cents to one dollar per week, according
to the occupation of the suite of rooms by two students or by
three. Rooms can also be obtained, at reasonable rates, with
families in the town.
�14
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
Board.
Board can be obtained in the village at moderate rates.
Probably good board could be secured, at a lower price, by the
formation of clubs among the students. The University stew
ard will be authorized, in such case, to aid clubs, by the pur
chase of stores for them at wholesale, and by securing rooms.
Fuel.
The direct communication with the neighboring coal mines
D
O
gives advantages in this respect. The University steward will
purchase coal at wholesale, and retail it to students at whole
sale prices.
OFFICERS AND EQUIPMENT OF THE UNIVERSITY.
Faculty.
A resident Faculty will be in readiness, which, it is believed,
will command the confidence of all friends of advanced and
extended education. In addition to these, it is intended to
secure, as non-resident professors, a number of gentlemen
especially distinguished to deliver courses of lectures in their
several departments. Several gentlemen of acknowledged
eminence in science, literature and the practical arts, have
already signified their willingness to accept such positions, and
it is intended to announce the names of the Faculty, resident
and non-resident, through the public prints, early in the summer
of 1868. The system recommended by the President in his
“Plan of Organization,” has been adopted, which is to “secure
for the resident professorships, for the hard work of building
up the University, active, energetic young men who have a
reputation to make and who can make it; and for the non
resident professors, men of the highest reputation, who will at
once elevate the whole tone of instruction and give us from the
outset a position which could not be attained in any other
manner.”
Buildings.
Two large stone buildings, four stories in height, have
already been erected; another of the same character is in prog
�THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
15
ress. In these, besides dormitories for over three hundred
students, are library, lecture and recitation rooms, over thirty
in number, and of various sizes.
Laboratories.
There will be two laboratories well equipped, one under the
'direction of the professor of agricultural chemistry, and the
other under the professor of general chemistry.
Collections.
The University already possesses the Jewett collection in
Palseontology and Geology, at a cost of ten thousand dollars,
and has received a donation from the State of a collection of
duplicates from the State geological collection, and has funds
now in hand to make large additional collections for illustration
in the different departments.
Libraries.
The trustees feel warranted in stating that the University
will commence with a scientific and general library sufficient
for the immediate wants of Faculty and Students, and constant
appropriations will be made for its increase.
Student Labor and Practical Instruction in Agriculture.
There is much labor to be done upon the farm attached to
the Agricultural department, and a large number of students
can be employed from one to three hours a day, at fair prices.
Shortly after the organization of the University, the University
steward will organize voluntary corps for systematized and
remunerated labor, unde” the direction of the Professors of
Agriculture and Engineering.
Student Labor and Practical Instruction in the
Mechanic Arts.
It is intended to erect workshops upon the University prop
erty where students, under proper direction, can have practical
instruction in Mechanic Arts. The first of these will be a
£
�16
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
workshop fitted with the proper machinery for working in
wood and iron, in which students can labor at fair prices
upon agricultural implements and machinery in general, and
upon models for the University collections of machinery and
apparatus.
Accomplished artisans will superintend this work, and the
attention of those young men who would qualify themselves,
by scientific study, for the most responsible and remunerative
positions as master mechanics and superintendents of work
shops, is invited to this feature in the course of practical
instruction.
Prizes.
The following prizes are offered by the Founder of the Uni
versity to aid meritorious students :
To the student of the Volunteer labor Corps in Agricul
ture, who, without neglecting his other University
duties, shall have shown himself most efficient,
practically and scientifically, upon the University
farm,............................................................................. $50
To the second in merit,..................................................... 20
To the third in merit,......................................................... 10
To the student of the Volunteer labor Corps in the
Mechanic Arts, who, without neglecting his other
University duties, shall have shown himself most
efficient, practically and scientifically, in the Uni
versity workshops,..................................................... 50
To the second in merit,..................................................
20
To the third in merit,............ '..............................
10
The above shall be known as the “ Founder’s prizes.”
00
00
00
00
00
00
The following prizes are offered by the President of the
University to aid meritorious students :
To the student showing the most satisfactory progress
in the “ Modern Course ” during the first year,... $50 00
To the second in merit,..................................................... 20 00
�17
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
7
To the student showing the most satisfactory progress
in the “ Combined Course ” during the first year,.
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the student showing the most satisfactory progress
in the “ Classical Course ” during the first year,...
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the most meritorious student in General and Analytical Chemistry,.....................................................
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the most meritorious student in Chemistry as ap
plied to Agriculture,................................................
To the second in merit,....................................................
To the most meritorious student in Practical Mechanics
and Physics,.................................................................
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the most meritorious student in Civil Engineering,
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the most meritorious student in General History,..
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the most meritorious student in Modern History,..
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the most meritorious student in Botany,..................
Tb the second in merit,.....................................................
To the most meritorious Report or Thesis upon an
original investigation in Agriculture,....................
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the most meritorious Report or Thesis upon an
original investigation in Geology,..........................
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the writer of the best English Essay,......................
To the second in merit,.....................................................
To the third in merit,.........................................................
To the student who, without neglecting his other duties
as a member of the University, shall make the
most satisfactory development in physical culture,
To the second in merit, .. <,...............................................
To the third in merit,........................................................
8
K
$50 00
20 00
50 00
20 00
50 00
20 00
50 00
20 00
50
20
50
20
50
20
50
20
50
20
00
00
00
00
00
00
00
00
00
00
50 00
20 00
50
20
50
20
10
00
00«
00
00
00
50 00
20 00
10 00
�18
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
The committees of examination reserve the right to withhold
a prize where the competition shows a standard not sufficiently
elevated.
*
The above shall be known as the “President’s prizes.”
ORIGIN OF THE UNIVERSITY.
The establishment of the Cornell University is due to the
combined bounty of the General Government and of the lion.
Ezra Cornell.
On the second of July, 1862, Congress passed an act grant
ing public lands to the several States and Territories which
may provide Colleges for the benefit of Agriculture and the
Mechanic Arts.
1
Under this act thirty thousand acres for each of its Sena
tors and Representatives in Congress were appropriated to each
State, and under this provision the share of the State of New
York was in land scrip representing 990,000 acres.
From the first, the State of New York determined to cease
the policy of scattering its educational resources, and to con
centrate this fund in a single institution worthy so great a
Commonwealth.
Common sense, with the very signal failure of the Sta>te
of Michigan in scattering such a fund, and her great success
after concentrating it were conclusive in favor of such a
policy.
Acting upon this idea, the State first appropriated the entire
amount of land scrip to the People’s College upon certain very
easy conditions. These conditions not being complied with,
the Legislature, by chapter 585, of the Laws of 1865, following
the same policy of concentration, against much opposition and
many attempts to scatter the fund, re-affirmed its old decision
to concentrate the fund, by overwhelming majorities in each
house, and gave the proceeds of the entire amount of scrip to
the Cornell University on certain conditions, of which the most
important were, that Ezra Cornell should give to the Institu
tion five hundred thousand dollars, and that one student should
annually be received and educated, free of all charge for tuition,
�THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
19
from each of the one hundred and twenty-eight Assembly Dis
tricts of the State, as a reward of merit for superior scholarship
in the public schools or academies. Such.student to be desig
nated by a competitive examination, to be conducted on a plan
laid down in the act.
At the first meeting of the trustees thereafter, Mr. Cornell
complied with the conditions of the charter by a gift of five
hundred thousand' dollars in due form. He then made the
additional gift of two hundred acres of excellent land, with
buildings, as a farm to be attached to the Agricultural Depart
ment ; the Jewett collection in Geology and Palaeontology,
which had cost him ten thousand dollars, and since that time
other gifts to the amount of twenty-five thousand dollars.
Besides this, Mr. Cornell has expended about three hundred
thousand dollars in purchasing the land scrip anti locating the
lands for the University, and it is proper to state here, that, *
previous to all these gifts, he had erected in the village of
Ithaca, at a cost of nearly one hundred thousand dollars, a
free public library with large halls, and with lecture rooms
which will be exceedingly useful as affording supplementary
accommodations for the lectures and public exercises of the
University. Thus laying the foundation for a sure and a large
endowment, sufficient to enable the trustees to tender, as soon
as the fund shall suffice, free board as well as instruction to the
State Students.
Relations
oe the
University to the State.
The act organizing the Cornell University makes it an
organic part of the educational system of the State. The
Governor, Lieutenant-Governor, Secretary of State,. Superin
tendent of Public Instruction and Speaker of the House of
Assembly are ex officio trustees. • The President of the State
Agricultural Society is also ex officio a member of the board.
It’may be mentioned here, that the Board of Trustees are not
a body sitting for life, but that they are constantly renewed,
the term of office being five years ; three being selected every
year—one of them by the Alumni whenever they shall number
�20
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
fifty. This, it is hoped, will do much to insure vigor and
prevent the stagnation from which so many institutions of
learning have suffered.
Scope op the University.
The special department referred to above will be developed
conscientiously and as thoroughly as possible. The prominence
plainly given the first two by the Act of Congress will be loy
ally remembered. It must also be constantly recollected that
education is here to be made, not only scientific, but practical.
Military education will also be provided for. Moreover, the
trustees are also pledged to try fully and fairly the experiment
of allowing students in appropriate departments to do some
thing toward paying their way by organized manual labor,
under scientific direction. This, however, will be voluntary,
as the freedom of our University demands.
But beside these special departments, the trustees provide,
in accordance with the clearly expressed intent of the Congres
sional act, general instruction. Mr. Cornell’s gift is made in
order to round the whole institution into the proportions of an
University worthy of the State. He expressed plainly and
tersely the whole University theory when he said, “ I would
found an institution where any person can find instruction in
any study T
Features of the University.
First. Every effort will be made that the education given be
practically useful. The idea of doing a student’s mind some
vague general gofod by studies which do not interest him, will
not control. The constant policy will be to give mental disci
pline to every student by studies which take practical hold upon
the tastes, aspirations and work of his life.
Second. There is to be University liberty of choice. Several
courses carefully arranged will be presented, and the student,
aided by friends and instructors, can make his choice among
them.
When we consider that young men are constantly obliged to
make choice unaided in regard to matters of even more difii-
�*
THfi CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
21
culty and danger than courses of study, it will not be thought
so absolutely necessary that but one single course should be
allowed, and all men pf all minds forced to fit it.
Third. There will be no Fetichism in regard to any single
course of study. All good studies will be allowed their due
worth. While the beauty and worth of ancient classics will
not be denied, it is hoped to give the study of modern classics,
especially those of our own language, a far more important
place than they have hitherto held in our colleges. Special
attention will be paid to these.
Fourth. Historical studies and studies in Political and Social
science will be held in high honor, and will have more atten
tion than is usual in our higher institutions of learning.
Besides thorough regular courses, it is intended to present
special courses of lectures by non-resident professors of emi
nence.
Fifth. There will be no petty daily marking system, a pe
dantic device, which has eaten out from so many colleges all
capacity among students to seek knowledge for knowledge’s
sake. Those professors will be sought who can stir enthusiasm,
and who can thus cause students to do far more than under a
perfunctory piecemeal study.
Sixth. It enters into the plan adopted by the Board of the
Cornell University to bring about a closer and more manly
intercourse and sympathy between Faculty and students than
is usual in most of the colleges.
Seventh. The study of Human Anatomy, Physiology and
Hygiene, with exercises for physical training, will be most
carefully provided for.
Eighth. The Cornell University, as its highest aim, seeks to
promote Christian civilization. But it cannot be sectarian.
Established by a general government which recognizes no dis
tinctions in creed, and by a citizen who holds the same view,
it would be false to its trust were it to seek to promote any
creed or to exclude any.
The State of New York, in designating this institution as the
recipient of the bounty of the general government, has also
�2^
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
declared the same doctrine. By the terms of the charter, no
trustee, professor or student can be accepted or rejected on
account of any religious or political opinions which he may or
may not’hold.
”
*
The success of the University of Michigan, where the Faculty
comprises men of all religious sects and of all parties, is a suffi
cient refutation of those who assert that an institution of learn
ing must be sectarian to be successful.
Access
to the
University Town.
The Cornell University is established at Ithaca, Tompkins '
county, New York. From the south, east and west, the most
easy access is by the New York and Erie railway, leaving that
road at Owego and taking the cars for Ithaca.
From the north, east and west, access is easy by the New
York Central railroad, taking the “old road” between Roch
ester and Syracuse, and leaving it at Cayuga Bridge, whence
steamboats run directly to Ithaca.
Any additional information can be obtained of Francis M.
Finch, Secretary of the Board of Trustees, Ithaca, New York,
or of Andrew D. White, President of the University, Syracuse,
New*York.
'
'
REPORT.
To give in brief the latest exhibit of the affairs of the
University, the following report of the recent meeting of the
Trustees is appended, as published in the Albany Evening
Journal, of February 15th :
The meeting of the Trustees of the Cornell University, held
Thursday at the Agricultural Rooms, was one of the most
gratifying since the inception of that enterprise.
The reports presented by the various committees showed the
most satisfactory condition of the University in every respect.
The financial basis seems even better than the most sanguine
�THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
23
have hoped. Of the buildings, one large edifice in stone is
ready for students, and two more will be ready at the opening
of the University in September; giving excellent accommoda
tions for nearly four hundred students.
The Jewett Cabinet in Geology, etc., is all arranged ready
for use, and negotiations were ordered in relation to other
scientific collections, including that of Dr. Newcomb, of San
Francisco; which, with one or two exceptions, is the finest of
its kind in existence.
The report of the President showed that seven Professors
had already been appointed, as follows : .
President—Andrew D. White, LL. D., formerly Professor
of History in the State University of Michigan.
Professor of Mathematics—Evan W. Evans, A. M.
Professor of South European Languages and Associate
Professor of History—W. C. Russell, A. M.
Professor of Physics and Medicine—Eli W. Blake, Ph. D.
Professor of Chemistry—James M. Crafts.
Professor of Agricultural Chemistry—George C. Caldwell.
Professor of Comparative Anatomy and Natural History—
Burt G. Wilder, M. D.
•
The following Professors were elected Thursday:
Professor of Military Science—Major J. H. Whittlesey,
United States Army.
Professor of North European Languages and Librarian—
Daniel W. Fiske, A.M.
Professor of Mining and Metallurgy—J. II. Mitchell, A. B.
Also, the following as non-resident Professors:
Professor of Natural History—Louis Agassiz, LL. D.
Duties, twenty lectures each year.
Professor of Mechanics applied to Agriculture—Governor
Frederick Holbrook, of Vermont. Duties, twenty lectures
each year.
Professor of General Geology—James Hall, LL. D., State
Geologist of New York. Duties, twenty lectures each year.
Professor of English Literature—James Russell Lowell
Duties, twelve lectures each year.
�24
THE COKNELL UNIVERSITY.
Professor of Recent Literature—(jEorge Wm. Curtis.
Duties, tweive lectures.
Professor of Constitutional Law—Theodore W. Dwight,
LL. D. Duties, twelve lectures on the Constitution of the
United States.
All these gentlemen, with the exception of Governor Hol
brook, have already entered heartily into the plan, and will be
ready to give instruction at Ithaca during the first year, and it
is believed that Governor Holbrook will not hesitate to accept
this position. His election was the result of a vote taken in
the Executive Committee of the State Agricultural Society, at
the request’of the Cornell trustees.
It is intended to commence instruction on the third Wednes
day in September, with eighteen resident and about ten non
resident professors.
All the leading courses, general and special, will then be
opened, including modern course, scientific course, and classical
course, and special courses in agriculture, mechanic arts, civil
engineering, mining, military science, and history.
A gift was received from President White of one thousand
dollars to be distributed in premiums, to the most meritorious
students in the various departments, who jshall enter the first
year.
Another gift of three * hundred dollars was received from
another gentleman to be applied to the same purpose.
On motion of Hon. William Kelly, President White was
requested, during his approaching visits, to investigate the insti
tutions for Agricultural and Industrial Education in England,
France and Germany, and to report at his return. Also to
superintend purchases of bonks, apparatus, collections, etc.
The plan of general military instructions presented by Major
Whittlesey, was ably supported in its main features by Lieu
tenant-Governor Woodford, and adopted.
Much satisfaction was experienced regarding the elections
thus far for the Faculty.
The plan of organization of the President has been carried
out fully in this respect. That plan is “to have for the hard
�THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
25
work of building up the University mainly young and active
men—men who have a reputation to make, and who can make
it.” Great pains have been taken to secure the most promising
young men for this purpose, and the Committee have been
strongly aided by Professors Agassiz, Dana, Gibbs, Chandler,
President Alden, President Wilson, President McClintock
and others. With one exception, every one of these young
resident Professors "have had the best instruction, both in lead
ing American and European institutions.
Professor Evans, who graduated with the highest honors at
Yale, in 1851, was afterward acting Professor of Mathematics
at that institution, and then at Marietta College, Ohio, and in
both of these positions he distinguished himself as a teacher
and a writer. lie is the author of a mathematical text-book in
extensive use, and of papers in Silliman’s Journal. For the
last year he has been studying a second time in Europe.
Professor Russell graduated at Columbia College, N. Y.,
and won golden opinions as a Professor at Horace Mann’s Col
lege in Ohio. lie is now studying in Europe.
Professor Caldwell studied at the Agricultural College at
Cirencester, England, and afterward at the University of Got
tingen, Germany, and is now Vice-President of the State
Agricultural Society of Pennsylvania.
Professor Blake graduated at Yale, first in the classical and
afterward in the scientific school, then studied at Heidelberg,
Germany, four years. He has been Professor in the Uni
versity of Vermont, and is now acting Professor at Columbia
College.
Professor Crafts, after graduating at the Harvard Scientific
School, studied chemistry four years in France and Germany.
Though a young man, his original investigations were published
by the French Academy of Sciences and Silliman’s Journal.
He is now lecturing in the Cambridge Scientific School, where
he is Assistant Professor.
Professor Wilder is a graduate of the Lawrence Scientific
School, and now the First Assistant of Professor Agassiz.
Though one of the youngest of all he has distinguished himself
4
�26
THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
as a lecturer, he having delivered a course of the “ Lowell Lec
tures” in Boston, and a course of University lectures at
Harvard. He is the author of sundry contributions to Silliman’s Journal and the Atlantic Monthly.
Professor Harris studied at the Agricultural College at
Cirencester, England; was afterward leading editor of the
Genesee Farmer, and lias succeeded in applying science to
agriculture in a common-sense way and in 'making it pay.
Professor' Whittlesey is a graduate of West Point, Major in
the regular army, and the estimation in which he is held is
shown by the fact that he was appointed by General Grant
expressly to draw up a national plan for military education to
meet the wants of the increased army, to be presented to
Congress.
Professor Fiske was formerly at Flamilton College, where
he attracted attention for his zeal in literature. lie afterward
studied at the University of Heidelberg, in Germany, and
Upsala, in Sweden. Returning to America, he contributed to
the New American Encyclopaedia, and did other excellent
literary work. Going abroad again, he was .for a time the
secretary and trusted friend of Motley, the historian, our min
ister at Vienna. Returning, he was made literary editor of
the Syracuse Daily Journal, where he gained the respect of a
large circle of friends.
He is now traveling in Egypt and the Holy Land as a cor
respondent of several leading journals. It should be mentioned
that while he was contributing to Appleton’s Encyclopaedia he
was assistant librarian at the Astor Library, where he gained
the experience which induced the Cornell authorities to make
him not merely a professor but also librarian of the University.
Professor Mitchell is a St. Lawrence county boy, who studied
engineering at Union College under the lamented Gillespie;
then was an engineer upon sundry railroads, then Principal of
the High School at Davenport, Iowa, where he organized the
whole school system and distinguished himself as an instructor;
thence to Harvard, where he graduated among the first in his
class; then into the army, where he did faithful service in the
�THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY.
27
Topographical Engineers; then to the Training Schools of Paris
and Frey berg.
It will be seen that these are “ live men,” and in selecting,
them the Committee have been guided by the fact, not merely
of their energy and ability, but also of nobleness of character.
The Committee have been mindful of the fact that a Professor
to succeed must be not only a scholar, but a man and a gentle
man, and it is believed that in the above selections such have
been secured.
Of the non-resident Professors it is unnecessary to speak.
The reputations of Agassiz, Governor Holbrook, James Rus
sell Lowell, James Hall, George William Curtis and Theo
dore W. Dwight, are part of American History.
ft was determined to have a joint meeting of Trustees and'
Faculty immediately after the return of President White early
in July, and to make at that time all final arrangements neces
sary for commencing active instructions in September.
��
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The Cornell University at Ithaca, N.Y. : First general announcement
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[1868]
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Education
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Conway Tracts
Cornell University
Education-United States
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Text
Art. VI. — The Higher Education of the United States.
(1.) LInstruction Publique aux ftats-Unis, Ecoles Publiques,
Colleges, Universites, Ecoles Speciales. Rapport adresse au
Ministre de VInstruction. Publique, par M. 0. Hippeau, Professeur de Faculte Honoraire, &c. Paris. 1870.
(2.) The Educational Institutions of the United States: their
Character and Organization. Translated from the Swedish of
P. A. Siljestrom, by Frederica Rowan. 1853.
(3.) A Visit to some American Schools and Colleges. By Sophia
Jex Blake. 1867.
(4.) Various Reports:—Minnesota, Wisconsin, Chicago, Iowa,
1 llinois, a/nd Cornell Universities; Lafayette, New York City,
and Da/rtmouth Colleges; Norwich and other Free Academies;
various Polytechnic Institutes and Industrial Universities ; State
Normal Schools, and Pennsylvania, Michigan, and other Agri
cultural Colleges. 1867-8-9.
(5.) Reports of Vassar College for Young Ladies, and of Oberlin for
Youth of both Sexes.
(6.) The Daily Public School in the United States. Philadelphia.
1866.
1
.About a year and a half ago, we gave in this Review a tolerably
full account of the system of primary education pursued in the
United. States. We developed at some length the theory on
which it is founded—a theory unique in the history of educa
tion—which, regarding the people as potentially the rulers of
the nation, assumes that the Government, as representing its
collective will, has a right and a corresponding obligation
to secure for every member of the community, at its own
charge, instruction and training sufficient to prepare him to
exercise his duties as a citizen; and we showed both the
remarkable general success, as well as some of the conspicuous
shortcomings, of the actual working of the system. The sub
stantial accuracy, both of our facts and deductions, has been
admitted by competent authorities in the United States. Mean
time, the complaints of truancy, late attendance, apathy of
parents, culpable neglect of country school-boards, untrained and
inefficient teachers, poor school-houses, &c., are rather increasing
than diminishing, and the demands for authoritative interven
tion to adjust the practice to the theory wax louder and louder.
The political problem, indeed, of reconciling the almost un
bounded liberty of the American citizen with the right of the
State to constrain obedience, is still, it must be confessed, far
�2
Theory of American Primary Education.
from being solved; and this state of things largely influences the
condition of primary education in the United States. It is only
those who are ignorant of the facts that talk of that condition as
satisfactory ; all who carefully investigate them know that it
is not. It can, however, scarcely be doubted that the resolute
will of the nation will in time overcome this difficulty, and that
we shall see ‘ the most extensively educated people in the world’
(Fraser and Hippeau) also the most soundly educated.
We found this conviction in a great degree on the remark
able development within the last few years of the higher
education of the country, the influence of which cannot, in the
nature of things, fail greatly to stimulate and improve the lower.
We propose in this paper to describe at some length the
machinery by which that higher education is carried out, and in
doing so to testify to the spirit, energy, and intelligence of the
nation—the intelligence which perceives what is wanting to
place its educational institutions on a par with those of the
most advanced countries of the world, and the spirit and energy
which are devising the means for supplying it. In accomplishing
our purpose, we shall have to repeat a few of the particulars
before given, in order to present a clear view of the relation
between the several parts of the system.
The theory of American primary education contemplates a
continued course of instruction to be carried on at the public ex
pense between the fifth and eighteenth years of the pupil’s age.
When this course is concluded the responsibility of the State
ceases; it has prepared the youth for his d uties as a citizen.
Should he, for professional or other purposes, wish to continue
his education, he must, unless exceptionally aided by scholar
ships, &c., pursue it at his own charge. The full course of
elementary instruction which the State thus offers free of charge
to all its citizens, male and female, embraces three stages—
(1) the Primary School, for children of from five to eight or
nine years of age ; (2) the Grammar School, for those from nine
to thirteen; and (3) the High School, for those between thirteen
or fourteen and eighteen years of age. Together they form the
‘common-school’ system, and are so organically connected that a
child commencing the course in the primary school at five years
of age may pursue it, stage by stage, until he emerges at the
age of eighteen from the high school, prepared to commence the
ordinary business of life, or to enter on a collegiate or special
professional career of advanced instruction. This system, it
will be observed, offers not merely elementary but also superior
education to all the citizens ; such superior education, indeed, as
in other countries is generally monopolized by the rich and
�The Higher Education of the United States.
3
privileged classes. M. Hippeau enthusiastically descants on the
*
conception thus presented to his view :—
‘ Where,’ he says (p. 335), ‘is the nation that can boast, as the
Americans do, of possessing schools in which the whole juvenile popu
lation can learn, without charge, not only reading, writing, arithmetic,
drawing, and a little geography and history, as they do in our primary
schools, but everything which constitutes that secondary education
which amongst us is reserved for families in easy circumstances, and
which some timid spirits believe cannot be offered without danger to
the children of the working classes ? ’
The high schools, or schools for secondary education, which
we now proceed to describe in detail, form the culminating point
of the common-school system, and are in some respects its most
satisfactory exponent. The instruction given in them is con
ducted almost uniformly by men of eminent attainments, long
experience in teaching, and great zeal, who are as a general rule
fairly rewarded for their labours, a point by no means sufficiently
provided for in the case of the primary and grammar-school
masters, who are often miserably underpaid. The result is that
the high schools, especially in the larger towns, attain a very
advanced degree of excellence. Bishop Fraser, in describing
those of Boston, speaks of the American High School as one
which he would have liked, had it been possible, to ‘ put under a
‘ glass case and bring to England for exhibition, as a type of a
‘ thoroughly useful middle-class school.’ He was particularly
struck by ‘ the excellent spirit that seemed to pervade it—the
‘ healthy, honest, thorough way in which the work, both of
‘ masters and pupils, seemed to be done.’ The energy and life
of the high schools generally is attested by all who visit them.
M. Hippeau thus describes his own impressions on this point,
and in doing so also illustrates the external machinery of the
system:—
‘Wherever,’ he says (p. 72), ‘I have found these superior schools
established, I have witnessed in the pupils an eagerness to do well,
* M. Hippeau was deputed, in 1868, by M. Duruy, the then Minister
of Public Instruction in France, to examine into the education generally
of the United States. In November, 1869, he presented his very interest
ing Report to M. Bourbeau, M. Duruy’s successor. M. Hippeau examined
the whole field of American education, and reports upon it all in the most
favourable sense possible. He scarcely indeed hints at a fault anywhere.
All is couleur de rose. This somewhat indiscriminate panegyric detracts
from the value of his judgment respecting the merits of the American
system as a whole. He was evidently unprepared for the energy, zeal,
public spirit, and intelligence which characterize the efforts made, in the
large towns especially, to advance popular education, and eulogizes,
therefore, rather than criticises, what he saw.
�4
High School Curriculum.
a zeal, an emulation, which indicate the value that they attach to the
studies which they have voluntarily chosen for their course. They
pursue them without requiring constraint or severe discipline. Ample
and well-ventilated class-rooms in elegant buildings, provided with
everything that can render study attractive and profitable, libraries,
cabinets of chemistry, physics, and natural history, museums, musichalls, gymnasia for military exercises, short sessions, varied exercises,
frequent recreation—everything contributes to make these noble
institutions, confided often to the direction of superior men, interesting
to the pupils/
The curriculum of studies pursued with the advantage of
these means and influences is large and comprehensive. It
embraces classics, foreign languages (especially French and
German), mathematics in their fullest extent, with practical appli
cations to mensuration, surveying, navigation, &c.; political
economy, logic, mental and moral philosophy, natural theology,
the physical sciences, practical mechanics and engineering,
together with the English language and literature. It is not,
of course, to be imagined that every pupil introduced to this
formidable programme of arts and sciences ventures upon more
than a small portion of it. After a few months spent in ascer
taining that the foundation previously laid in the grammar
school is solid and may be depended upon, the parents of the
pupils are required to select for their children such studies ’ as
they may wish them to pursue, and from that time the course
determined on is maintained to the end. In the larger towns
there are Latin high schools, in which classical instruction takes
the lead, and English high schools, in which science and general
subjects are substituted for classics; the former answering, with
notable differences, to the Gymnasia, and the latter to the RealSchulen of Germany. All pupils are admitted on a ‘ thorough
and searching examination’ (Fraser), held twice in the year by
the principal and teachers of the high school, under the super
vision of the committee of the school, with a view to perfect
impartiality; ‘the reputation of the grammar schools being sup‘ posed to depend in public estimation upon the number of
‘ candidates which they succeed in passing.’ No pupil under
twelve years of age is allowed to compete for entrance, and in
many cases it is stipulated that the candidate must have attended
the grammar school for at least twelve months. The average
age of the pupils who pass is thirteen. About one-fourth of the
candidates are annually rejected, and sent down to the.grammar
schools from whence they came for further preparation. The
subjects of the entrance examination are in most cases spelling
(to which a high degree of importance is attached), reading,
�The Higher Education of the United States.
b
arithmetic, modern geography, and the history of the United
States. With this equipment the pupil enters the high school
course, which lasts for -four or five years, and ends, in some few
■of the larger towns—in Philadelphia, for instance—in the
attainment of a diploma attesting satisfactory advancement.
As an illustration of the intelligent teaching found in the
best of these schools, we may quote a passage from Bishop
Fraser’s Report. He was present himself during a lesson
in English literature, given at the girls’ high school at Boston
to a class of girls of about eighteen years of age. It consisted,
he says, of—
‘ reading, paraphrasing, grammatical analysis, mutual criticism, and
general literary appreciation and taste. The class bad commenced the
play of “ Hamlet,” and were engaged that day on a passage from the
first scene of the first act. It was read by one girl, paraphrased by
another; the paraphrase had to run the gauntlet of general criticism;
questions were proposed as to the meaning of this phrase, the definite
allusion in that; objections were raised to this and that interpretation,
illustrations were adduced, and the whole exercise was characterized
by much spirit and life.’
Mr. Anthony Trollope, in his ‘ North America,’ had pre
viously given an amusing account of his visit to a ladies’ school
at Boston which he does not name, but which was probably that
which is above referred to :—
‘In one of the schools,’ he says, ‘they were reading “Milton,” and
when we entered were discussing the nature of the pool in which the
devil is described as wallowing. The question had been raised by one
of the girls—a pool, so called, was supposed to contain but a small
amount of water, and how could the devil, being so large, get into it ?
Then came the origin of the word “ pool,” from
a marsh, as we
were told—some dictionary attesting to the fact—and such a marsh
might cover a large expanse. The “ Palus Meeotis ” was then quoted.
And so we went on, till Satan’s theory of political liberty, “Better to
reign in hell than serve in heaven,” was thoroughly discussed and
understood. These girls of sixteen or seventeen got up one after
another, and gave their opinions on the subject, how far the devil was
right, and how far he was manifestly wrong.’
He then expresses his surprise at the remarkable ease and
self-possession with which the girls discussed such questions—
‘just as easy in their demeanour as though they were stitching
‘ handkerchiefs at home.’
Notwithstanding the fun that Mr. Trollope gets out of his
peep into a girls’ class of literary critics, there can be no
doubt that much intellectual life is kindled and sustained by
the practice above described, which evidently aims at bringing
�6
Teaching of English Composition.
the pupil’s mind into as complete a contact as possible with the
author’s. It would be well if something of this ‘ spirit’ could be
substituted in many of our schools of superior instruction for the
stolid, stultifying adoration of the ‘ letter,’ which finds and
leaves the pupil’s mind entirely on the outside of the text which
he is professedly studying. At the same time we venture to
consider it very desirable, that while much indulgence is granted
to young pupils in their early efforts to think, a corrective
in the shape of definite knowledge should always be at hand,
lest easy speculations about morals, religion, and political topics,
eliciting no doubt much native talent, but not tending to
mental discipline, should come to be estimated at too high a
rate. A stricter training would probably do much to repress
that ‘tall talk’, which prevails so much in America, and which
so conclusively indicates the defective cultivation of the person
who indulges in it.
*
The tendency to this elevated style is, it must be admitted,
even fostered at some of the girls’ high schools by the practice of
handing over to the press, instead of to the waste-paper basket,
compositions which evince nothing whatever but the remarkable
immaturity of the writers’ minds, and the need of close and
severe mental discipline. It would be easy to illustrate this
morbid state of things by quotations from ‘Prize Essays’
before us; but it would be hardly fair to the writers to laugh at
them, inasmuch as the persons chiefly to blame are the teachers,
who have so badly consulted the interests of their pupils as to
let the world know that such essays ever were written. If we
judged, then, of the high-school system by its too frequent pro
duct in the matter of English composition, we should pronounce
it to be showy, flimsy, and unsatisfactory ; but we do not. The
mistake in such cases as this is not the production, but the
publication, of school exercises as specimens of English ‘composi
tion ; ’ a point in regard to which, as we have hinted, the teachers’
reputation, rather than the pupils’, is impeached. The tendency
to inflation and bombast in style is, however, by no means
* Take the following specimen, extracted from a speech delivered
in Congress three or four years ago. The speaker is referring to the
fruits of the recent war: —‘No gentle speech, “no candy courtesies,”
no dull oblivion of the pregnant past, befits the crisis that is on us
now. We have just trodden the wine-press of revolution, to encounter
at its closing doors the bloodier form of anarchy; while the untamed
fiends of the rebellion, their appetites inflamed and their hands drip
ping with the blood of the martyrs, laughed—as none but the damned
could laugh—at the rising vision, but dimly foreshadowed by the St.
Bartholomew’s of Memphis and New Orleans, of the opening of another
seal, which should turn our rivers into blood, and visit upon us and our
children more than apocalyptic woes.’
�The Higher Education of the United States.
7
confined to the crude exercises of pupils; it pervades the reports
of school superintendents, in which, not unfrequently, very small
thoughts are dressed up in unconscionably voluminous folds of
words. This ‘incontinence of words’ is a remarkable trait in
the educational literature of America. The late Horace Mann
—a man worthy of all reverence for his most honourable
labours in the cause of education—afforded frequent instances of
it in his, in other respects, valuable reports. He was by no
means convinced—at least, his practice belied such a conviction
—that the ‘ bright consummate flower’ of the highest literary
effort is simplicity. As regards this question of ‘ English com
position’ generally, we venture to suggest, by the way, that
the aim should be rather practical than literary, and that the
elementary teacher who succeeds in getting his pupils to write
with ease, simplicity, and grammatical accuracy on the commonest
topics of daily life and experience, does them a far better service
than the teacher who stimulates them to literary effort. The
seed-time should never be confounded with that of flowers and
fruits.
In view of the provision of a complete course of elementary
instruction for every citizen of the nation, it is natural to inquire
how far it is actually carried out. It is evident that the theory
can only be fully satisfied by the passing of all the children who
attend the elementary schools through the entire course. We
see, however, in what takes place in America in this as well
as in many other respects how difficult, indeed, how im
possible it often is, to realise a plausible theory. In the case
before us the theory which assumes that a certain quantity
of instruction (to say nothing of quality) is necessary for the
proper equipment of a citizen for his duties, is defeated by many
adverse causes, and especially by the imperative demands of
society for the work of its citizens, be their education what it
may. It appears from the report of a New York assistant
superintendent (quoted by Bishop Fraser), that ‘ not more than
‘ one-half of the children who attend the primary schools ever
‘ enter the grammar schools,’ and ‘ that a considerable number
‘ do not even complete the primary course ’—that is, they leave
school at about nine years of age. The general result indeed is,
that only about one in one hundred of those who enter the pri
mary schools ever pass on to the high schools; and of these about
one-fourth stop short at different stages of the higher course.
In Boston the proportion is about one in thirty-three, while in
Philadelphia it is only one in one hundred and fifty. Again,
it must be remembered that these statistics apply only to large
towns, in which alone high schools are required to be set up.
�4,
Charges against the High School System.
The law of Massachusetts—a State which presents the best
type of American education—requires a high school to be
established in towns of more than 4,000 inhabitants. In towns
of 5.00 inhabitants the grammar school, with its very limited
curriculum, is the necessary consummation of the theory of
‘ a complete course of instruction for all the citizens of the
‘ State? We state these facts, not with the view of reproaching
the Americans with their failures, but to correct that somewhat
loose and vague manner of talking about American education,
which confounds the theory with the facts.
It is important, in considering the general question of the
value of superior education to a commonwealth, to call attention
to the complaints which are beginning to be very freely raised
by some of the enlightened educationists of America, that the
superior or high school education is unwisely stimulated to
the injury of the lower and more essential instruction. It must
be remembered that at present gratuitous instruction is furnished
not only to the poorer classes, whose circumstances require help,
but also to those classes who do not need it, and who receive it
as a means of advancing the interests of their children by
preparing them for active and professional life. Now, the
training of the latter class involves an immense expenditure at
the public charge on the few who receive it, and the question is,
whether it is wise or just to lavish public money in stimulating
that which it is alleged would be secured in the case of those
really requiring it, through private and personal means
In
other words, the question is, whether the promotion of superior
education at the public expense brings with it an advantage to
the public interest, which compensates for the imperfect accom
plishment of the theory of ‘ the education of the citizen ’ in
the primary schools ? The author of the very interesting pam
phlet on 1 The Daily Public School in the United States,’ which
has been much quoted lately in England (especially by that
eminent educational authority, Lord Robert Montagu), argues
this question at length, and. shows, by adducing an immense
body of facts, as we also showed in our former article, that the
primary school system throughout the States generally is in a
very unsatisfactory condition, while at the same time the ambi
tion of the people leads to the unnatural—as he views it—
encouragement at the public expense of schools for superior
instruction. His views may be gathered from the following
extract:—
‘We shall not,’ he says (p. 24), ‘be understood as denying that
instruction of various and much higher grades than the daily public
school supplies should be easy of access to all who are disposed to seek
�The Higher Education of the United States.
9
it, but we maintain that this should be the natural outgrowth of the
public school, and should be sustained by other means than a general
public tax. The income from that source should be restricted to the
thorough accomplishment of the preliminary work. Why should we
not educate machinists, engineers, and farmers at the public charge, as
well as book-keepers and bank clerks 1 ’
To show that this question is not one of speculation only,
we may refer to the fact that in 1866 a motion was introduced
into the City Council of Philadelphia for disallowing the funds
for supporting the Boys'’ High School. The mover stated his
belief that a ‘majority of the citizens were in favour of abolishing
4 the school.’ 4 We tax the people,’ he went on to say, 4 to give
4 them an equal system of education, but only about four per
4 cent, of the pupils can be educated in the high school. Of
4 those educated there, at least seventy per cent, are drones
4 upon the community.’ This speaker, however, showed that
it was not sordid considerations of expenditure, but a patriotic
desire for the real interests of the commonwealth, which moved
him, by expressing his desire that the money gained by the
abolition of the high school should be expended in raising the
standard of instruction in the lower schools. Another speaker
insisted that they 4 should compel every child to attend school
4 until a certain age. He thought the 27,000 dollars asked for
4 the high school would be of more service if appropriated to
4 educate those who now never go to school. The city should
4 give a fair English education and nothing else.’ Another
4 doubted the propriety of maintaining a college out of the money
4 of the taxpayer;’ and a fourth 4 was in favour of abolishing
4 the high school, because the grammar schools would then be
4 fostered, and the system of cramming a few pupils to get them
4 in (into) the high school done away with.’ The grant was,
however, in the end carried, and the high school maintained.
It came out as a curious and anomalous feature of this debate,
that a motion for increasing the salaries of the teachers of the
primary schools (and thus, one would think, increasing the
desired efficiency of these schools) was negatived by a con
siderable majority. The writer of the pamphlet referred to;
after showing in some detail that the highest education of the
country was well provided for by the multiplication and ample
endowments of classical, polytechnic, and commercial colleges
of various grades, thus pursues his argument to its legitimate
conclusion:—4 So that in fact the real educational wants of the
4 country, in these higher grades, would be well supplied without
4 the elaborate and expensive machinery of high and normal
4 schools sustained at the public charge; and,’ he adds, 4 there is
*
�10
Imrortance of Principles and Theories.
‘ no principle sounder and more practical, touching the functions
‘ of government, whether civil or domestic, than that it should
‘ not do for people what people can and should do for themselves.’
At the same time he repeats his disclaimer of any desire to abate
in the slightest degree the interest that is felt in the higher
grades of schools. ‘We have no controversy,’ he says, ‘with
‘ the friends and advocates of the largest liberality in dealing
‘ with the whole question of popular education. Let the super‘ structure have whatever magnitude and fashion it may, our
‘ eyes are just now fixed on the foundation. Our fear (we may
‘ almost say our belief) is, that through neglect of this, and the
‘ desire to make a lasting and imposing display in school archi‘ tecture (material and metaphorical), we shall find sooner or
‘ later that even if we have a reading, we shall not have an
‘ educated people.’
The grave importance of the question at issue, as above stated,
must be our apology for the space we have given to it. It is
important, both in an economical and political point of view. To
give to those who are not in need what you withhold from those
who are, is bad economy; to stimulate to ambitious display
while you neglect what is fundamental but comparatively
obscure, is bad policy. On the other hand, it may be justly
argued that the encouragement of the higher education tends
to raise the standard of the lower, and that no nation can hope
to attain the highest rank which fails to appreciate the im
portance of the highest cultivation.
*
It is essential to diffuse as
widely as possible practical instruction suited to the daily wants
of the people; but it is also most important to carry on the in
struction so as to embrace principles and theories, which consti
tute, after all, the goal to be aimed at in a complete course of
mental training. The man of rules and formulae is not strictly
speaking an educated man, nor can he be so considered until he
is in possession of principles and theories as well. It is these
especially which give life and power; that life which quickens
life in others, that power which emancipates from the slavery
of routine. The man who merely understands the formula
2 + 2 = 4 is, as the accomplished author of the ‘ Autocrat of the
Breakfast Table’ ingeniously remarks, in a totally different
intellectual condition from the man who understands « + &=<?.
‘ We are mere operatives, empirics, and egotists, until we learn
‘ to think in letters instead of figures.’ At the same time,
however, that we admit the importance of encouraging by
incidental means, such as private endowments, &c., the culti* ‘ Le peuple qui a les meilleures ecoles est le premier peuple.’—Jules
Simon.
�The Higher Education of the United States.
11
vation of exceptional native talent, we rather agree with the
dissidents whose opinions we have cited in doubting whether
it is a duty of the State to supply with gratuitous education at
the public charge, those whose avowed object it is to make that
education merely a means of personal advancement. It is the
more important that we should in England understand this
question, as even now many students are receiving at the public
expense, in our normal schools for primary teachers, a course of
education which does not benefit the public service, inasmuch
as—so we are informed—an increasing number of certificated
masters, ostensibly trained for the public service, is regularly
employed in private schools. We cannot, however, pursue the
subject further in this place.
It is sufficiently evident from what we have said that the
high schools are the most characteristic and most successful
feature of the American system. The education given in the
primary schools (including the grammar schools) is not, perhaps,
on the whole, superior in quality to that given in our own
schools conducted by certificated masters, though the system of
grading by which, as we have before explained, the different
classes of schools are organically connected together, tends to
stimulate the more ambitious scholars to efforts transcending
those generally put forth among us. The number of such
energetic spirits, as tested by their advancement from one
grade to another, is, however, as we have shown, compara
tively small. Our remarks are intended to apply to the great
bulk of the schools, as scattered over the whole country,
*
and taught very generally in rural districts by utterly un
qualified teachers, who, itinerating from district to district every
few months in search of better pay, have no real interest in
the profession which they have for the time adopted, and whose
work is very rarely' tested by authoritative and competent
inspectors. These are not the schools which visitors are invited
to admire ; on the contrary, the reports of school superintendents
are filled to overflowing with complaints of their many and
striking defects—defects as regards management, school-work
ing, methods of teaching, and, in short, almost all the
acknowledged characteristics of really good schools.f It is
* It is computed that about twenty-eight out of every thirty children
in the United States attend the schools of the rural districts. It is to
them, therefore, and not to the privileged minority, that our remarks
apply.
t Some of these reports were quoted in our former article. The
following extract from ‘ The Daily Public School in the United States,’
as to the general results, is worth quoting, though the words are those
of a witness who is obviously concerned in making out a case:—‘ Such
�12
College and University Education.
true that they are gradually improving, and mainly because
female teachers, not so much given to wandering restlessly about
as the men, and qualified by zeal and earnestness and a fair
amount of knowledge, have in so many instances since the war
superseded the masters.
In passing from the High Schools to the Academies, Colleges,
and Universities of the United States, it is important to observe
that the latter have no organic connection with the former.
The commonwealth has done its work when it has conducted
its young citizens to the threshold of the collegiate course.
If they wish for further instruction, they must expect to gain
it, as a general rule, at their own charge, and in their own way.
Their special pecuniary or personal interests are supposed to
supply the requisite stimulus to further effort. The State has,
by theory, made them well-informed and well-trained men, but
it does not engage to make them architects, lawyers, engineers,
or farmers. The professional education necessary for success in
these pursuits is regarded simply as the means towards a
personal end, that end being presumably the attainment of
lucrative and honourable positions in cultivated society. As,
however, the State is itself interested in having these positions
occupied by well-qualified men, it comes forward, in many
cases, especially in that of the agricultural colleges, with sub
stantial aid towards the attainment of this object. In general,
however, the colleges and universities of America are the
product of magnificent private endowments, furnished by the
patriotic zeal of individuals, and are quite independent, in all
that concerns their internal management, of State control or
interference. The arrangement of studies, the appointment of
professors, and the distribution of funds, are directed by the
constituted authorities of the institutions themselves, and all
that the State has to do with them is to secure them in their
independence.
It is interesting to contrast for a moment the difference
between the spirit which has called these establishments into
being, with that which controls machinery of the same kind in
some of the older countries, for example in France, a point on
which M. Hippeau dwells with considerable fervour. In the
one case, we see individual or local effort taking the initiative,
‘ observation as we have been enabled to make in interviews with many
‘ thousands of children and youth [in the rural districts] satisfies us that
< nine in ten of them are incompetent to read properly a paragraph in the
‘ newspaper, to keep a simple debtor and creditor account in a mechanic’s
‘ shop, or to write an ordinary business letter in a creditable way, as to
< chirography, orthography, or a grammatical expression of ideas ’—
(p. 11).
�The Higher Education of the United States.
13
relying on itself for success, contriving its own machinery, and
only seeking to prevent that interference with its free action
which would compromise or neutralize its inherent spirit. In
the other we see a central administration, directing all the
schools, colleges, and universities of the country, appointing all
their officers, fixing all their programmes and methods of
instruction, specifying the text-books to be employed, and
regulating and controlling all the expenses. The end aimed at
in the two cases is the same; but how widely different the spirit
and the means ! We do not ourselves quite agree with M.
Hippeau in considering, as he appears to do, the one system as
altogether wrong, and the other altogether right. Centrali
zation is, we know, the bete noire of the Americans, to be shunned
and abhorred, as they believe, in its every aspect; but we also
know that, especially as regards their common school system,
they are at this moment suffering severely for their unwise
dread of it, and that the recent appointment of Mr. Barnard,
as the Minister or Commissioner, as they style him, of public
instruction, though a virtual compromise of the principle, has
been already attended with most beneficial results. When—
and that time will surely come—it is seen that a truly repre
sentative government is simply the embodiment of the popular
will, the co-ordination of the two apparently opposing forces of
centralization and decentralization will achieve successfully much
that is now accomplished feebly and imperfectly. Leaving,
however, this question unsolved, we proceed to quote again
from M. Hippeau a passage in which he paints in glowing
colours the actual working of the collegiate system in the United
States:—
‘ These colleges,’ he says, ‘ are not located in the midst of populous
towns, but generally in their neighbourhood, and are surrounded by
a pleasant open country, where the pupils breathe pure air, and can
walk without constraint by the banks of the brooks, or under the
avenues formed by grand old trees (arbres seculaires). Many separate
buildings, each having a special destination—chapel, class-rooms, library,
common hall, cabinet of natural history, scientific museums—are
grouped round the residence of the president. On all sides elegant
cottages serve as dwellings for the professors, who may there serenely
give themselves up to their favourite studies. Lastly, at no great
distance from the college there are private houses where the pupils
find board and lodging, ignorant of the vexations and restraints of
discipline, following the course of study laid down by their teachers,
working at their own time (ck leurs Aeures),and finding close at
hand all the necessary appliances, supplied for their use at great cost.
With the professors their relations are those of affectionate respect.
They listen to their advice with deference, and gather from their
�14
‘ Mixed ’ Colleges for both Sexes.
instructions a mass of information which happily supplements the
teaching of the class-room’—(p. 199).
We will not mar this charming picture by a word of suspicious
criticism, but proceed to describe in detail such of these insti
tutions as are characterized by special features.
Among them stand out some which, as far as we know, are
unique in conception, and well deserve our careful attention.
We refer to such as collect together under one roof, or, at least,
in one locality, and under one direction, large numbers of young
men and women for the purposes of united instruction. There
are so many obvious theoretical objections to such an arrange
ment, that we hear with some surprise of its remarkable
and increasing success.
M. Hippeau was fairly struck with
amazement at the working of a system which, as he could
not but allow, would be utterly impossible in France, and
which we must also allow, would be all but impossible in
England. We can well believe that the flagrant ‘ gallantry ’ of the
French, the ‘drinking habits’ so prevalent in some of our public
schools, the sensuality and debauchery of Sandhurst, and the
Vandalism lately displayed at Christ Church, Oxford (we refer
only to facts publicly stated), would accord but indifferently with
the moral habits of institutions in which ‘ all use of intoxicating
liquors ’ and even smoking are strictly forbidden —regulations
*
which, as appears by all the evidence accessible, exist not only
on paper but in fact. We do not pretend to discuss all the
phases of the interesting social and educational problem pre
sented by these ‘ mixed ’ colleges, involving as it does, amongst
other speculative questions, that of the mental equality of the
sexes; but we may fairly contend that if students of both
sexes could be brought together in pursuit of a common object
without danger to morals, many economical and social ad
vantages would result. Men would become more refined, -and
women more self-reliant, while it would be more generally
acknowledged that women have an especial stake in the interests
of society, with an ability and a right to discuss them, which
are now, to the detriment of those interests themselves, so fre
quently ignored or denied. AVe hold it to be an omen of
especial promise that women’s opinions are, amongst ourselves,
gradually but energetically acting on public opinion itself, and
moulding it, as we believe, for good. The extravagance which
manifests itself occasionally here, and to a far greater extent in
* ‘La defense de ftnner, partout prescrite et partout violee (in France),
‘ est scrupuleusement observee a Oberlin grace a la presence des jeunes
‘ filles, envers lesquelles aucun eleve ne voudrait manquer d egards.
—Hippeau, p. 111.
�The Higher Education of the United States.
15
America, in the utterance of those opinions, will be gradually,
we doubt not, corrected by the very exercise of the right to
express them, in proportion as women generally—not merely
‘ advanced women ’—take part in such discussions. When the
spectacle of well-informed, intelligent, sensible women, devoting
their special qualifications of acute perception, ready tact,
and aptness for business to the problems of society, shall
become less rare than it now is, we firmly believe we shall be
much nearer the solution of those problems. We further
believe that the improved education of women is the direct
means to that end, and that it is highly probable, though,
perhaps, not as yet proved, that the association together of the
sexes from earliest youth in the pursuit of a common object, in
which both are so deeply interested, is destined, by the mutual
aid and incentive it affords, to be the most powerful agency by
which that improved education will be secured. As to the
question of the capacity of women to compete in the intellectual
field, as far as common education is concerned, we hesitate not
to say that the American experience has removed it from the
platform of theory to that of fact. Whenever boys and girls,
young men and young women, are set down to an examination
paper, founded on instruction which they have equally received,
it is found that the average of success in answering it is quite
as often in favour of the weaker as of the stronger sex; and,
indeed, that those of the ‘ more worthy gender ’ are often
ingloriously beaten. Then, as to the vital question of morals;
all the evidence adduced by Miss Jex Blake, and confirmed in
every respect by M. Hippeau's more recent investigations, goes
to show that if there is any danger it is guarded against and
prevented by the wisdom and prudence of the directors of
these establishments, who, as M. Hippeau remarks, are not
so blind as not to see abuses if they existed, and not so
destitute of moral principle themselves as to tolerate them
if they saw them. These gentlemen are unanimous in de
claring that the evils hinted at exist in surmise only and
not in reality.
*
To our mind the most conclusive evidence of
all is the continued and ever-increasing prosperity of the largest
of these institutions—the Oberlin College, in Ohio—during
a period of nearly forty years.fi It would seem quite impossible
* M. Hippeau learned that in the course of the five years ending 1868,
only one girl out of the 200 or 300 of the higher classes was expelled at
Oberlin, and that was for an offence against order rather than morals.
He further attests that there is no town in the United States the streets
of which are, night and day, so quiet and undisturbed as those of Oberlin.
fi The number of students of both sexes (rather more than half of whom
ar© females) which, when Miss Jex Blake visited Oberlin in 1865, was
SOI, had increased in 1868, when M. Hippeau was there, to 1,258.
�16
Oberlin College.
in the nature of things that the parents and guardians of
1,300 pupils (the present number)—persons whose moral and
religious characters are quite as respectable as those of t^.
corresponding classes amongst ourselves—would send their
children to an institution against which any serious moral
charge could be brought. We assume, therefore, that no
serious moral charge can be brought against these mixed com
munities, though we dare say that a considerable amount of
folly and frivolity might be detected without a very close
inspection. Even on this point, however, the evidence is very
strong that the pupils in general are remarkably distinguished
by the earnestness and zeal with which they pursue their studies.
The Oberlin College, to which we have just referred, may
be taken as a type of those intended for the instruction of both
sexes. Its modest commencement in 1833—under the patriotic
impulse of the Rev. John Shepherd, a Presbyterian minister,
and his friend, Mr. Stewart, who had been a missionary among
the Cherokee Indians—in the midst of a clearing gained from
a dense forest of North Ohio, gave little promise, in the thirty
pupils established in log huts run up to meet the emergency,
of the seven large school buildings, representing a capital of
£32,000, the twenty professors (with numerous assistant-teachers)
directing six distinct courses of study, the 1,300 pupils of both
*
sexes, and the town of 5,000 inhabitants which now compose
the ensemble of Oberlin. When the college was first opened,
‘ the Indians’ hunting-path,’ we are told, ‘ still traversed the
‘ forest, and the howl of the wolf was heard at night,’ and for
more than two years ‘the devious tracks through the forest were
‘ often impassable to carriages.’ The design of the founders
was to establish ‘ a school, open to both sexes—preparatory,
‘ teachers’, collegiate, and theological—furnishing a substantial
‘ education at the lowest possible rates,’ and combining manual
labour with mental study. The idea thus sketched out has
throughout preserved its original features, though the last
condition, involving handicraft work of some sort for four hours
daily, is no longer obligatory. It still, however, exists for
those who may choose to avail themselves of it. The bulk of
the students at Oberlin are children of parents to whom economy
is an important object, and in order to reduce the expenses
of education to a minimum, and consequently to offer its
advantages at the lowest possible rate, rigid frugality reigns
* ‘ Coloured students, varying widely as to hue, form about a third of
‘ the whole number, and I suppose there is hardly any community in
‘ America where the coloured and white races meet on so real and genuin®
‘ a footing of equality as at Oberlin.’—Miss Jex Blake, p. 17.
�The Higher Education of the United States.
17
throughout the whole establishment. Hence the professors’
salaries even are ‘ meagre ’ (Miss Jex Blake’s expression), and
the arrangements generally of buildings and appliances, &c.,
exhibit ‘ an utter absence of all the appearances and pretensions
of wealth.’ The education given under such circumstances is
perhaps not of the highest order of excellence, nor are the
*
graces cultivated to an undue extent. Miss Jex Blake (who
spent ten days at Oberlin, and employed them well) speaks of
the ‘ almost absolute deficiency of polish of manner ’ which
prevailed. She was especially surprised at ‘ the incessant spitting
‘ that went on during class hours, as well as at all other times.’
It is to be devoutly hoped that the influence of the softer sex
may in time prevail so far as to repress entirely this distinctly
masculine accomplishment of too many native Americans. Our
lady reporter was not less amazed to see ‘ young men (at their
‘ classes) with their heels poised on the back of the next seat,
* about on a level with their heads, or their legs stretched out on
* the seat beside them, while an examination was going on in
‘ perhaps quite abstruse branches of study, which are usually in
‘ our minds associated with a very considerable degree of
‘ culture.’ These features are not pleasing in themselves, and
are less so when we consider that a large proportion of the
young men under instruction at Oberlin are destined to become
masters of the primary schools, and therefore models of manners
to their pupils. Notwithstanding these drawbacks, however,
there can be no doubt that very much good work is done at
Oberlin. An earnest love of learning pervades the classes, in
most of which young men and women sit together (though at
different benches), and the general result is eminently satisfactory.
It should be remarked that it is the educational life only which
is common to both sexes—the social life, its boarding and
lodging, being completely separate, with the single exception
that the midday repast is pleasantly shared in common, without
any restriction upon the intercourse between the young men
and women, who meet as members of the same family. The
pupils of different sexes are forbidden, Miss Jex Blake assures
us, to walk to and from the classes together, a regulation
‘ which,’ she adds, ‘seemed to be well obeyed;’ but M. Hippeau,
whose rose-coloured glasses may have betrayed him, speaks of
their ‘walking and riding together within certain prescribed
limits,’ and even of the young men ‘ having the privilege of
* ‘It is only right to say that we had previously heard some accusations
‘ against Oberlin for want of thoroughness in study, and the recitations at
‘ which we were present hardly convinced us of the injustice of the
‘ charge.’—Miss Jex Blake, p. 22.
�18
‘ Religious Exercises ’ at Oberlin.
* admission to the house occupied by the young ladies at certain
‘ hours, after tea, for instance, until seven or eight o'clock in
‘ the evening.’ We evidently want further information on
some of these points. Into the details of studies, text-books,
&c., we cannot enter, but our description of Oberlin would be
incomplete without some reference to one very characteristic
feature. The institution was founded, in the first instance,
on a thoroughly religious basis. It was to be surrounded by
‘ a Christian community, united in the faith of the Gospel,’ and
a covenant of ‘ consecration to the work ’ was framed, binding
its subscribers to a ‘common purpose of glorifying God in doing
good to men.’ The spirit of this Puritan constitution is still
strictly preserved. The ‘ religious exercises’ are very frequent;
‘ morning prayer in the families, and evening prayer in the
‘ chapel, forming but a small part of them. There were in‘ numerable “ Sabbath-schools ” and prayer-meetings announced
‘ from the pulpit on Sunday, and during the week prayer‘ meetings and lectures seemed of daily occurrence ’ (Miss Jex
Blake). To such an extent are ‘religious exercises’ carried,
that every separate lesson begins with either a hymn or a
prayer. Miss Jex Blake confesses that she was more struck
than edified when present at a lesson on physiology, which was
preceded by the singing of ‘ All hail the power of Jesu’s
name,’ &c., and followed instantly ‘as the last word of the
* verse died out,’ by the voice of the lecturer briskly demanding
‘ What did I say were the physical functions ? ’ Upon the
religious element, which is thus seen to pervade the spirit of
Oberlin, and which is further manifested in the strongly
expressed desire for ‘ revivals ’ as a means for intensifying
it, we do not venture, in the absence of more definite infor
mation, to pronounce a judgment. We simply echo Miss Jex
Blake’s opinion, that unless very carefully watched over and
guided, it must tend to produce an unhealthy tone of cha
racter both as regards religion and morals. Nor is it irrelevant
to the subject to add that there appears throughout the entire
community an indisposition to physical recreation. There
is no suitable provision made for it, and no gymnasium exists
for either sex. ‘ During our ten days’ stay, we saw no sign
‘ whatever of athletic sports or exercises, unless indeed, some of
* the students belonged to a company of firemen recently
‘ established, who exercised in front of our windows. The
* utmost physical recreation seemed to consist in a country
‘ walk, and I doubt if even this was common, though a large
‘ number of the students had just returned from the disbanded
‘ army. This absence of desire for physical sports seems more
�The Higher Education of the United States.
19
‘ or less common throughout America3 (Miss Jex Blake). This
lack of a proper corrective, both to the effects of the very
earnest spirit of study that prevails at Oberlin, and the
tendency to morbid excitement which we have referred to,
is surely very serious, and ought to be supplied by the autho
rities, at whatever cost. It is, perhaps, both cause and effect
of the phenomena we have pointed out.
Leaving Oberlin, with its economical arrangements and
somewhat rough machinery, we next consider one of the largest
ladies’ boarding-schools in the world, the Vassar College, at
Poughkeepsie, on the Hudson, which, with its palatial facade
of nearly eight hundred feet, pleasure-grounds of nearly two
hundred acres, library of seven thousand volumes, art gal
lery, music-room, laboratories, astronomical observatory (with
first-rate instruments), natural history museum, calisthenium
(containing a riding-school one hundred feet long, and a
gymnasium seventy feet long), bowling-alley for in-door
exercises, lake for boating in summer and skating in winter,
forms, it must be acknowledged, an institution of a truly
remarkable character. M. Hippeau, indeed, declares that
there is no place of instruction in the world equal in ‘mag
nificence’ to this college for young girls. It was founded
some seven years ago at the expense of Mr. Vassar, an opulent
brewer of Poughkeepsie, with a view to accomplish for young
women what colleges of the first class accomplish for young
men—that is, to furnish them the means of a thorough, wellproportioned, and liberal education, adapted to their wants in
life. Mr. Vassar gave during his lifetime (he died two years
ago) about £100,000 towards the accomplishment of this object,
and left at his death £30,000 more, to form. (1) a lecture fund ;
(2) a library, art, and cabinet fund ; and (3) an auxiliary fund;
the last for aiding students of ‘ superior mind and sound scholar
ship’ to enjoy the advantages of the place at a reduced rate.
The arrangements are adapted to receive 400 young ladies,
each of whom pays about £80 a year, exclusive of text
books, stationery, and music and riding lessons. The total
expense seems to be about £100, and there were 382 girls (every
five of whom have a common sitting-room) in the school when
the last yearly report was issued. It will be seen that, con
sidering the value of the capitalized income, and the (for
America) large sum paid by each pupil, there is no lack of
funds, and hence the noble scale on which the whole of the
educational machinery is framed. A candidate for admission
must be at least fifteen years of age, and must submit to examina
tion in arithmetic, English grammar, modern geography, and
�20
Vassar College for Young Ladies.
the history of the United States, so strict ‘ that further lessons
‘ in these subjects will not be needed, no provision being made
‘ for such instruction in the college.’ The programme of studies
for the four years’ course is large—even as some competent
European observers think, too large—but this ambitious fault is
one which generally characterizes the educational efforts of the
United States, and which only experience will correct. It will
in time be found out that ‘ Multum non multa,’ and ‘ Qui trop
embrasse mal etreint,’ are cardinal principles in the teaching of
the young. The plan of ‘ bifurcation’ allows each pupil to
choose between (1) the Classical course; and (2) the Scientific
and Modern Language course; and there is every reason to
believe that the instruction, received under the advantages of
first-rate professors and costly machinery of every kind, is of a
*
very superior order. W e are glad to see that the prospectus of
studies especially insists on the laying of a good foundation.
The first year, called the ‘freshman (!) year,’ is devoted to
mental discipline and solid attainments, not to specious advance
ment.
‘ Great importance is attached to this early part of the course, as
preparatory to what follows. It is a cardinal point in the plan to
teach nothing in a mere compendious and superficial manner ; and all
experience shows that it is a sad waste of time to set young girls of
fifteen or sixteen years of age, without any proper intellectual pre
paration, at (sic) the studies which belong to the junior and senior
years (that is, the third and fourth years) of the college course.’
Such is a brief account of the leading features of an institution
which M. Hippeau, after examining schools of all kinds through
out the United States, pronounced to be in many respects the
most remarkable of them all.
The colleges of America are very numerous, and present
every variety of type. They are mostly first called info being
by the noble generosity of private individuals, and afterwards
maintained by fees. A college, in respect to its curriculum of
studies, is generally an advanced high school, but having no
organic connection with the national system. There are said to
be in all the States together about 290 of these institutions,
with about 3,000 teachers, giving instruction to between 70,000
and 80,000 pupils. The libraries attached to the colleges contain
in all about 1,800,000 volumes. The title of ‘university,’ which
* There are eight professors and about thirty teachers on the staff,
besides Dr. Raymond, the president, and Miss Lyman, the lady principal.
The professor of astronomy is a lady (Miss Mitchell), as is also the resi
dent physician (Miss Alida Avery). The teachers of Greek, Latin, and
mathematics are ladies.
�The Higher Education of the United States.
21
is given to a few of them, appears merely to indicate an institution
in which the course of instruction is larger and more complete.
Many of these colleges are founded on a decidedly denominational
basis, and are intended for the special instruction, often mainly
theological, of various sects of Christians. This is particularly
the case with some of those which bear the distinctive name of
‘ Academies,’ which are governed generally by committees of men
holding strict religious opinions, and are selected by parents of
the same belief with the view of bringing up their children in
their own faith. The colleges and universities are generally
well attended. The University of Michigan has 1,500 pupils ;
Madison (Wisconsin), 775 ; St. Louis, 618 ; Cambridge (Harvard
College), 479; Yale, 505 ; Lexington, 650; Oberlin, 1,200;
Cornell, 425 ; St. Francis Xavier (Roman Catholic), 568.
Harvard and Yale College and Universities stand at the head
of all these institutions, though they are not the most nume
rously attended. The students are, however, generally of a
higher class, and the professors of a more distinguished literary
and scientific position, than those of the other colleges, while
the means and appliances of instruction are ample and sufficient.
Yale, especially, has, within the last seven or eight years, been
aided in a princely style by high-spirited, wealthy men, who
seem to take a pride in casting off their abundance into the
treasury of the educational fund. No less than <£180,000 has
been thus bestowed on Yale College from 1860 to 1868.
Amongst the donors, George Peabody’s name appears for
*
£30,000, and Joseph Sheffield’s for £34,000. It is extra
ordinary that amongst the fabulously wealthy noblemen and
merchant princes of England so very few similar examples are
to be found, f In America they swarm, as the history of nearly
every one of its grand educational institutions attests. It is not
necessary to enter into minute particulars with regard to any of
these colleges or universities. The problem being given how to
provide for the superior instruction of say from 300 to 700
students in a country where there is so little control over free
action, and where the initiative is usually taken not by the
State but by private individuals, we can readily believe that it is
frequently solved but indifferently—that the professors are not all
of a high order, nor the degrees which every college confers much
worth having. Indeed, the very idea of more than 300 centres of
* Mr. Peabody also gave £34,000 towards the Geological Museum at
Harvard.
t Mr. Whitworth’s recent appropriation of £100,000 to Scientific
Scholarships claims, however, to be conspicuously recorded as a noble
exception.
�22
University of Michigan.
learning sending forth as many guarantees of attainments, each
of course estimated on a different scale, seems, on the face of it,
absurd. To be a graduate of a college means, therefore, next to
nothing, and, generally, American degrees have not yet become
a power in the world of letters. They are often, too, most unac
countably flung at the heads of foreigners under the designation
of ‘ honoraryand there are at this moment English dissenting
* doctors ’ not ashamed to flaunt in the face of the world titles
thus, we might almost say surreptitiously, gained. The system
certainly reached the acme of absurdity when the College and
University of Waterville (a place we cannot find in any common
gazetteer) made a worthy Baptist minister—whom, probably,
not a single member of its faculty had ever seen—a ‘ Doctor of
Divinity.’ It is not only in literary style, as we showed before,
but in educational style also, that the Americans have still to
attain to simplicity. There is too much show, too much fuss, too
much ambition, too much pretension—in short, too much licence.
The common schools are suffering, as we have already said,
from the want of authoritative inspection, and the colleges for
want of a limited number of examining boards, which alone
should have the power of conferring degrees. Were some such
arrangement carried out on the pattern of our own University
of London, an academical degree in America would have a
definite and well-understood value, which at present it certainly
has not.
Among the numerous schemes for carrying out the funda
mental idea of a college or university (convertible terms, as
we have shown) in America, those of Michigan and Ithaca (the
Cornell) present some striking peculiarities. The former, with
its 1,500 students, is noticeable for its extensive range of studies,
and for the renunciation of all prizes and external distinctions
as incentives to exertion. Its curriculum embraces almost all
knowledge ; and it is evident, from all the evidence that
can be gained respecting it, that a very earnest spirit of work
prevails equally amongst teachers and taught. Its two great
divisions—the literary and scientific—are so arranged that
neither wholly excludes the other. It is justly conceived that
the humanizing influences of classical studies cannot be ex
cluded from the mental discipline which is necessary for a
complete education; while, on the other hand, it is seen that
to ignore in a country like America—teeming with practical
intelligence, and aiming at the subjugation of the powers of
nature to the daily service of man—the arts and sciences, which
directly minister to that conquest, would be not only absurd in
theory but impracticable in fact. The literary course, therefore,
�The Higher Education of the United States.
23
embraces a certain proportion of science and the scientific,
some initiation into the classical programme. As to the renunciation of prize-giving, the President, Mr. Haven, lately ex
pressed himself as follows :—
1 Young people,’ he said, 1 ought to learn early in life to perform
their duties without requiring us to appeal to their desire to obtain
first places, prizes, medals, or any other external reward of merit. It
is doubtful whether measures of this kind really elevate study, while
it is' certain that they engender discontent and envy—hatred, even—
and tend, moreover, to diminish proper self-respect in those who are
influenced by motives so ignoble. Experience,’ he adds, ‘ has proved to
the professors of our university, many of whom have been attached
to establishments in which the contrary method is pursued, that our
system is in no respect unfavourable to the efficiency of study, and
that it is incomparably superior to the other by the moral influence
which it exercises over the pupils.’
The remarkable popularity and success of the Michigan
University may also be regarded as a sufficient answer to
objections on this score. As a specimen of the style in which
educational apparatus is provided at Michigan, it may be men
tioned that the observatory is fitted up with instruments by the
first makers of Europe and America, with all the most modern
appliances for their use. The meridian circle is described as
magnificent, and is, indeed, the largest yet made, and the
refracting telescope has an objective lens of thirteen inches
diameter; so that, as M. Hippeau remarks, ‘We see here for
‘ the service of a university establishment in a small town of the
‘ United States, one of the most powerful and complete astrono‘ mical apparatuses to be found in the world.’ The art instruction
carried on at Michigan is also aided and stimulated by galleries
so richly provided with statues, busts, vases, medallions, and
copies of famous paintings, that M. Hippeau declares that
none of the colleges of Erance can show anything comparable
to them.
A distinctive feature worth mentioning is seen in the
curriculum of Lafayette College, at Easton, in Pennsylvania.
This is not one of the largest institutions of the kind, but it is
eminently distinguished by the intelligence and zeal which
pervade its arrangements (superintended by a first-rate Presi
dent, the Rev. W. C. Cattell, D.D.), and make themselves felt
in the success of the teaching. For some years past, under
the able direction of Professor March, the English language has
been made a prominent feature in the programme. The
professor treats the English author chosen for study—Milton,
for instance—as a competent classical teacher does Homer
�24
Normal Colleges.
or Virgil. The text is minutely analyzed, the mythological,
historical, and metaphysical allusions carefully investigated
and appreciated, parallel passages from English authors of
different periods adduced, and the rules of composition in
poetry or prose illustrated. As to the language itself, inde
pendently of the thought conveyed by it, investigations are
conducted into the origin, value, and chronological history of
the words, their formation, &c.; and in short, into everything
which belongs to the domain of comparative philology.
Nowhere else is the subject treated with equal competence and
*
success.
The Normal Colleges,which are numerous in the United States,
though owing their origin very generally to private munificence,
are, as being connected with the common school system, aided
by subscriptions from the State. They are mainly intended to
train teachers for the common schools, and the curriculum is
therefore somewhat limited in comparison with that of some
of the other colleges; but many of them are highly dis
tinguished by the earnest intelligence which permeates the
entire body, both of teachers and pupils; and what they attempt
and profess, they seem to do remarkably well. Miss Jex Blake
gives a most interesting account of that which she visited at
Salem, Massachusetts. She expresses her admiration in terms
similar to those in which Bishop Fraser praises the Boston
High School. She says, her ‘one regret was, that she could
‘ not transplant the whole affair bodily to England, that other
‘ teachers might share her pleasure in seeing any school so
* thoroughly well worked as this was by its excellent head
* master and a first-rate staff of most earnest lady teachers,
‘ whose actual erudition was almost overwhelming.’ ‘ Indeed,’
she adds, ‘ the amount of sheer learning acquired by really
* good teachers in America, has often surprised me.’ The
Salem school is for young women only, and from the account
given of its plans, it can hardly fail to turn out first-rate
teachers. The methods pursued appear to be characterized by
rare ingenuity and intelligence, while the tone and spirit of
the place is just that which one would wish to see repeated
in the schools where these young pupils are themselves to become
teachers. There seems every reason to believe that what in
the prospectus of the school is described as its ‘ aims,’ are really
attained. ‘From the beginning to the end of the course,
* Mr. March’s interesting “ Method of Philological Study of the English
Language ” (New York, 1865), is well worth the attention of teachers.
He has just published an “Anglo-Saxon Grammar,” which appears to be
far superior to any other that has yet appeared.
�The Higher Education of the United States.
25
‘ all studies are conducted with special reference to the best
‘ ways of teaching them. Recitation of English lessons alone,
‘ however excellent, are not satisfactory, unless every pupil
‘ is able to teach others that which she has herself learned.
‘ The great object of the school is to make the pupils investi* gate, think, and speak for themselves; to make the individual
‘ self-reliant and ready to meet whatever difficulties may
‘ arise.’ Here too, as in the Chicago University, in Dart
mouth- College, and others, extrinsic rewards of learning are
discountenanced. ‘ It is not deemed necessary to awaken a
‘ feeling of emulation in order to induce the scholars to perform
‘ their duties faithfully. The ranking of scholars according
‘ to their comparative success in studies is not here allowed.
‘ Faithful attention to duty is encouraged for its own sake, not
‘ for the purpose of obtaining certain marks of credit.’ These
are the words of the prospectus, and here is Miss Jex Blake’s
testimony, showing that the words are interpreted by deeds.
‘ Indeed, the whole spirit of the school seemed most admirable,
‘ whether as regarded the untiring zeal and energy of all
‘ the teachers—who were for ever doing work beyond what was
‘ required of them—whose one aim -seemed to be true and
‘ genuine success at any cost; or the ready industry and unflag‘ ging interest of the pupils—who co-operated so heartily with
‘ the teachers for their own progress ; or the general spirit of
‘ sympathy and natural goodwill that reigned over all. In the
‘ course of my many visits, I never once saw idleness or de‘liberate carelessness in a pupil, nor superficiality or impatience
‘ in a teacher; still less any appearance of jealousy or ill-will
‘ anywhere, and not a black look among the whole community/
Such a testimony from so competent an observer settles the
question in our mind (though we had no doubt before) of
the value of training for the teacher. It will be a bright
day for education amongst us when hundreds of such schools
shall be established in England, where every one ‘ who chooses
to think that he has a gift for teaching ’ is at perfect liberty
— without any knowledge whatever, and without the least
preparatory training—to perform any number of murderous
experiments, and for any length of time, upon the bodies, minds,
and souls of the wretched little victims whom evil fate throws
into his hands. The educational furore which is beginning
to take possession of the English public mind will, we venture
to say, avail comparatively little until the paramount want
of all—that of trained teachers—is felt and supplied. The
teaching of the teacher is the most vital question of the day;
and the solution of it concerns the whole community, from
�26
Scientific Schools and Institutes.
the patricians of Eton down to the urchins of the ragged
*
school.
If England is about the worst educated country in
Europe, it is not merely because so many children are not
taught at all, but because so many of our teachers know
nothing about the art of teaching. It is with them that our
efforts to improve English education ought rightfully to begin.
It is not surprising that with so practical a people as
the Americans, schools expressly founded to give instruction in
technical science, as well as Agricultural Colleges, should be
greatly encouraged. The progress that has been made in
this respect is truly surprising. Only the other day, Mr.
Siljestrom—whose report on American education still remains
by far the most thoughtful and philosophical of all that have
been published on the subject—expressed his surprise that
he found scarcely any institutions dedicated to the teaching
of the principles of science. He looked in vain for those
agricultural and technological colleges, which, as he deemed,
so well suited the genius of the people. At this moment he
would find thirty such institutions of the first class, richly
endowed with funds, and establishing themselves in the hearts
of the people by the intelligence and comprehensiveness of
spirit which conceived them and which maintains them in
efficient action. Among them the Sheffield Institute and the
Lawrence Scientific School, in connection respectively with Yale,
and Harvard Colleges, the Boston Technological School, the
School of Mines at Calombia College, the Agricultural Schools of
Amherst and Pennsylvania, have a deservedly high reputation.
The Technological Institute of Boston is one of the fruits
of the combination of private and State endowments, to which
*
we have so often referred. Its object is to form engineers, che
mists, builders, and architects. The four years’ course of instruc
tion embraces for the first two years (in which the studies are
common to all the students), algebra, geometry, descriptive
geometry, free-hand drawing, elements of mechanics, chemistry
with manipulations, descriptive astronomy, carpentering, the
English language and literature, French and German. The third
and fourth years are devoted to special instruction adapted to the
professions chosen by the students. The subjects are mechanical
engineering, civil engineering and topography, practical che
* “In no department of human activity is there such a pretentious
display of power, with such a beggarly account of results” (as in English
teaching).—Professor Blackie, of Edinburgh.
* Among the donors are Dr. Walker, £40,000; Mr. Huntingdon,
£10,000; Mr. Thayer, £5,000; Mr. Mason, £4,000; Mr. Hayward,
£4,000, &c.
�The Higher Education of the United States.
27
mistry, mining engineering, architecture, and a general course
of science and literature. To carry out these studies there
are vast laboratories for chemical, physical, and metallurgical
experiments, as well as schools devoted to practical car
pentering, levelling, geoiesy, and nautical astronomy. This
instruction is supplemented by visits to factories, mines, mills,
&c., so that the student goes forth to his business in life well
equipped with all that is necessary for success in it.
In the Agricultural Colleges the course pursued is very
similar. General education in literature and science precedes
the special business of the college, for teaching which, the
arrangements, made on a grand scale in the best of these
institutions, furnish every aid that is necessary. Practical
chemistry, animal and vegetable physiology and zoology, form
parts of the course, as well as experiments in the best methods
of cropping, manuring, planting, &c«
The question of the proportions in which the literary and
scientific elements should combine to form the cultivated man
is one of the highest interest to Englishmen as well as
Americans. It is under discussion in England, but it is
solving by action in America. The old traditions which are
still reverenced here are being superseded by antagonistic
movements there. The utilitarian spirit, which is liberally inter
preted amongst us, is more strictly interpreted amongst the
Americans. We have never in England tried the experiment
of training the mind on a scientific basis; our transatlantic
cousins are trying it for us. The results are, doubtless, interest
ing and striking ; but at present they must be considered as
inconclusive. Our limits, however, forbid our entering either
into a full discussion of the theory or a description of the results.
We may perhaps return, on some future occasion, to the subject,
contenting ourselves for the present with the remark that the
attempt to learn something of every science—an attempt which
has a strange fascination for Americans—is generally found to
end in failure. The average capacity of the human mind may
be looked upon as a ‘constant quantity,’ which you do not
permanently increase by inciting it to unwonted and often dis
tracting effort, any more than you increase the digestive powers
by unlimited supplies of food. It is still ordained that into the
kingdom of knowledge, as into the kingdom of heaven, we must
enter as ‘ little children; ’ nor can we conceive of a ‘ common
‘ measure ’ between the progress of a nation’s knowledge and
that of an individual, for whom, even were the sciences ten times
as numerous as they are, it will ever be necessary to begin his
Wn career with ABC.
We may, it is true, furnish
�28
The Cornell University.
an opportunity for learning everything; but then everything
cannot be learned. Non omnes omnia possumus. , Even to
know this requires something beyond mere knowledge ; and
should the provision of unlimited means of knowing lead only to
improved methods of cramming, the results will not be satis
factory. Cramming, we hold to be the unlawful attempt to
appropriate other people's work—to gain the results of labour
without the labour itself. The flowers thus plucked and stuck
into the ground may make a gaudy show, but they begin to
wither away at once, for they are severed from the root which
nourished and matured them. We do not say that the
American plans for superior education lead to cramming; we
merely point out an obvious cause of danger.
But we must give as complete an account as we can in a small
space of the last wonderful birth of the American earnest zeal
and lofty conception of the idea of a University. Nowhere
is this idea; realised as it is at the Cornell University at
Ithaca (N.Y.), an institution in which, in conformity with the
founder’s own conception, ‘ any person can find instruction in
‘ any study.’ Mr. Ezra Cornell, a private citizen of New York
State, adding from his own resources £200,000 to the Central
Government endowment—which is allotted to each State for the
special purpose of founding colleges of Agriculture and Me
chanical Arts—has achieved no ordinary fame in having his
name for ever associated with an institution which is, in many
respects, without a rival in the whole world. Every study that
has, in any age, been considered as forming a part either of the
training of the mind or of the practical exercise of its faculties,
finds here a representative department. There is, to use the
words of the prospectus, £ no fetichism in regard to any single
course of study’—all stand on the same footing; all have an
equal chance afforded them. The six main divisions are—(1)
Agriculture; (2) the Mechanic Arts; (3) Civil Engineering ;
(4) Military Engineering and Tactics ; (5) Mining and Prac
tical Geology ; (6) History, Social and Political Science. These
again are subdivided into forty-six special departments, each with
its separate professor and its distinct course of study. Then,
besides the professional staff which is responsible for the daily
teaching of the various classes, there is the novel feature of a
virtual affiliation of all the highest colleges of the United States
with this, by engaging their most eminent professors to take part
in the instruction given in the Cornell. These are attached
to the professional staff under the name of non-resident pro
fessors. The valuable services of Agassiz, Gilman, Dwight,
Lowell, Dana, Noah Porter, &c., are thus secured to the insti-
�The Higher Education of the United States.
29
tution. These gentlemen give courses of from twelve to twenty
lectures yearly, which are open without charge to the public of
Ithaca, as well as to all the students. It is needless to add that
all the material educational machinery—laboratory, library,
museum, gymnasia, observatory, &c.—is on a scale corresponding
with the fundamental idea. Everything is of the best modern
type—excellence, not cost, being the point of consideration.
There are a few exceptional points of interest in the idea and
the machinery of this university, which deserve further illustra
tion. First we note, what we have referred to already, the
extraordinary range of the curriculum, which simply compre
hends all human knowledge, theoretical and practical. In
consistency with this idea, the educational machinery embraces
the workshop and farmyard equally with the laboratory, the
museum, and the professor’s class-room, and, in short, arrange
ments are here made for teaching everything that anybody
can desire to learn. Everybody, moreover, who goes to Ithaca
has ‘ university liberty (a singular expression) in the choice of
studies;’ in other words, there is no prescribed course. The
constructors of the programme urge the great advantage of thus
allowing the student to choose the studies that he likes, inas
much as ‘ discipline {i. e., mental discipline) comes by studies
which are loved, not by studies which are loathed.’ We very
much question, however, the correctness of the principle thus
laid down, if it is to be strictly interpreted. It may be wise,
on the whole, to allow, under the circumstances, an un
restricted libertas discendi, but certainly not, as far as our
judgment goes, for the reason given. The very idea of mental
discipline seems to us to involve self-denial, restraint, patient
toil, endurance, and is, in fact, the fruit of the experience
gained by contending, by agonizing, as it were, with opposing
forces. Such discipline is surely not gained as a matter of
course, by doing merely the things we like and eschewing
those that we dislike, but mainly by the contrary course of
action. Few men probably have ever gained eminent rank in
arts, letters, or public life, whose position was not greatly
due to the fact of their being made by circumstances to do
things they did not like. Their conquest over difficulties, and
therefore over themselves, made them what they are. We do
not wish, however, in making these remarks, to seem captious,
but we do wish emphatically to demur to the principle laid down,
as the reason of a very important regulation. Experience will
at length decide the question at issue; but if in the meantime
it should be found that the studies which are easy attract much
of the love, and those which are difficult much of the loathing,
�30
Self-government of the Cornell University.
that result will only show, what was known before, that
American students are, after all, very much like those of other
countries.
The framing and the execution of the laws necessary
for preserving order are, for the most part, devolved on the
pupils themselves. After much deliberation, the authorities
decided to adopt 4 neither a military, nor the ordinary collegiate
discipline/ but the 4 free university system of Continental
Europe, where comparatively little is done by college police,
and much is left to the students themselves.’ ‘ In this system/
they remark, 4 the university is regarded neither as an asylum
4 nor a reform school. Much is trusted to the manliness of the
* students. The attempt is to teach the students to govern them4 selves, and to cultivate acquaintance and confidence between
4 Faculty and students.’ The author of ‘ Tom Brown/ in his inte
resting article in the July number of Macmillan, gives evidence
that the plan thus adopted at the foundation of the university
has proved efficient. In an institution to which the great bulk
of the students resort for the purpose of real study, and in which
disorder would defeat the very object in view, it is easy to see
that arrangements are possible, which, in our older universities
—which are for the most part attended by those who intend to
study as little as possible, and generally carry out their inten
tion—would be impracticable ; but we quite agree in spirit with
the author just quoted, in the wish that some stern authoritative
voice were appointed to thunder in the ears of hundreds of the
young men who are carrying on at Cambridge and Oxford the
farce of 4 study/ the old command—4 aut discite aut discedite.’
The expulsion of the drones from the hive would be a great gain
for English education.
In order to promote what is certainly a very desirable
object, a more free and sympathetic intercourse between pro
fessors and students, it is recommended 4 that additions be made
to professors’ salaries, expressly as an indemnity or provision/
to meet such expenses as might be involved, and arranging for
social meetings between the parties concerned. 4 The same prin4 ciple which has led wise Governments to make extra allowances
4 to ambassadors, for the express purpose of keeping up genial
4 social relations with the people among whom they are sent, is
4 the basis of the experiment now suggested.’ We are not
informed what success has attended this novel experiment.
Among the regulations, there is one curiously illustrative of
the business quality which prevails in all American arrangements.
It is,4 that the university will tolerate no feuds in the Faculty ;’
and it is founded on the fact 4 that the odium theologicum seems
�The Higher Education of the United States.
31
‘ now outdone by hates between scientific cliques and dogmas.’
The remedy is sharp and decisive: it is ordered that ‘ in case
‘ feuds and quarrels arise, every professor concerned be at once
‘ requested to resign, unless the disturbing person can be identi‘ fied beyond a reasonable doubt,’ and ‘ that all concerned be
replaced by others who can work together.’ ‘ Better,’ it is
added, ‘to have science taught less brilliantly than to have it
‘ rendered contemptible.’
Another of the notable features of this unique university is
the encouragement (not, however, the compulsory obligation) of
daily manual labour on the part of the students, with a view
both to improving their bodily health, and enabling those whom
it may concern to obtain the means of pursuing their education
at Ithaca. It appears that about a fifth of the five or six
hundred students of the institution have availed themselves of
the option given them. The experiment is yet in its infancy,
and no positive judgment can as yet be formed of its ultimate
success. It will probably not become a permanent feature of
the university. The time must arrive when the labour now
beneficially employed in the establishment itself will no
longer be needed, and the directors have no intention of setting
up workshops in rivalry of the industries of the country.
The last feature to which we shall refer, is the treatment
of the religious question. It is characteristic of the country in
which the university is situated, and indicates the condition of
things to which—as we believe for the honour of ‘ pure and
undefiled religion ’—we are tending in England. So long as
religion, or what is called such, is so closely connected with
social station, wealth and respectability, that ‘ each seems
either ’—religion being respectability, and vice versa—it is
difficult to distinguish that which is ‘ pure and undefiled ’ from
that which is not. The discussion of the principle, however, is
no part of our programme, and we therefore append, without
further comment, the official regulation:—
‘ The Cornell University, as its highest aim, seeks to promote
Christian civilization. But it cannot be sectarian. Established by
a general Government which recognises no distinctions in creed, and
by a citizen who holds the same view, it would be false to its trust
were it to seek to promote any sect, or to exclude any. The State of
New York, in designating this institution as the recipient of the
bounty of the general Government, has also declared the same
doctrine. By the terms of the Charter, no trustee, professor, or
student can be accepted or rejected on account of any religious or
political opinions which he may or may not hold.’
But we must stay our hand, while we leave an abundance of
�32
The Religious Difficulty.
interesting material untouched. We have aimed at presenting
an idea, as complete as our limits permit, of the vast machinery
employed in conducting the higher education of America. The
features which it has in common with those of similar institu
tions in the Old World, we have not dwelt upon. They can
easily be imagined. Those, however, which are typical and
illustrative of the remarkable public spirit, energy, zeal, and
intelligence which characterize the people, we have endeavoured
fairly and candidly to display.
�
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Victorian Blogging
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An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Title
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The higher education of the United States
Creator
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Payne, Joseph [1832-1907.]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [s.l.]
Collation: 32 p. ; 21 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
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[s.n.]
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[n.d.]
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G5683
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Education
USA
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English
Conway Tracts
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Dickinson College.
THE HISTORY OF A HUNDRED YEARS.
ALUMNI ORATION
DELIVERED AT THE
Centennial Commencement of the College,
Wednesday, July 27TH, 1883,
at 8 P. M.,
BY THE
Rev. Geo. R. Crooks, D. D., LL. D.,
Professor of Church History in Drew Theological Seminary,
Madison, New Jersey.
��PREFATORY NOTE.
In response to the wish of many who heard the address of
Dr. Crooks to have it in permanent form, as also in the interest
of the College, he consented, on request, to allow its publication.
It adds to our satisfaction in sending it forth, that many, not
favored to take 'part in the Centennial Commemoration may
thus have some compensation for their loss. While for the
former its perusal will renew the memory of a great pleasure,
for the latter it will at least instance and type the good things
which sons and friends prepared in honor of that event. The
College, too, will thereby profit, for its history of a hundred
years is the record of such heroic striving and honorable
achievement that it must, in the measure it is known, turn to
its advantage.
The address itself is every way admirable. The story of “
Dickinson has not before been told so fully or so well. To
begin with, there was evidently wide and painstaking research.
Every accessible source of information seems to have been laid
under contribution. From early local annals, from biographies
of men conspicuous in founding and fostering the College or in
conducting its operations, and from records of legislation, were
gathered the facts which so enrich the narrative. Especially
was Dr. Crooks favored in having access to a large collection of
manuscript letters preserved in the Ridgway Library of Phila
delphia, in large part the correspondence of Dr. Rush and
Dr. Nisbet, having immediate reference to the history of the
College, and now first availed of in making up the record of its
history.
Though not of special relevance to the address, it yet may be
of interest to its readers to state the result of efforts made to
strengthen the resources of the College. On adopting plans for
the Centennial Commemoration, the trustees expressed the
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judgment that the securing of One Hundred and Fifty
Thousand Dollars was the least amount at which the effort
ought to aim; two-thirds of this sum to be for increase of
endowment, and one-third for the erection of a building for
general college purposes. The noble gift of $30,000 by
Mr. Thomas Beaver, of Danville, Pa., and, shortly after, that,
equally noble, of the Rev. David H. Carroll, D. D., of Baltimore,
Md., of $10,000, both for the first of the designated objects,
greatly cheered those on whom lay the burden of solicitation.
Other donations of smaller amount, but in equal witness of
good-will, had at the date of the Commemoration increased the
aggregate to upwards of $45,000. In the annual meeting of
the trustees at the time of this event, order was taken for the
special appropriation of $20,000 to the erection of a building
for scientific purposes, and thereupon this amount was subscribed,
nearly all by members of the Board. At the social reunion on
the afternoon of the same day, on a proposition to endow a
professorship in honor of Dr. John McClintock, and to bear his
name, $23,000 were subscribed. Including the sums previously
subscribed and paid on the work of thoroughly renovating
East and West Colleges, the Centennial contributions to the
present time aggregate about $93,000. It will thus be seen
that the College enters on its second century not alone with
cause for glorying in the past, but with auspices of cheer. Like
Paul at Appii Forum, we devoutly feel, to thank God and
take courage.
j. a. McCauley.
Dickinson College, July 18th, 1883.
In a note from Dr. Crooks, received after this prefatory statement was in type, he thus
acknowledges his obligation to this correspondence:—“Many of the facts relative to the
founding of Dickinson College, the author of this address has derived from examination
of the unpublished correspondence of Dr. Benjamin Rush and his friends, now in the
possession of the Ridgway Library of Philadelphia. Through the courtesy of its Librarians
the author has drawn freely from this large storehouse of information and desires here to
express his thanks to them. To other friends who have also supplied original documents,
thanks are due and are here gratefully tendered.”
�Early in July, 1763, Carlisle presented an unwonted aspect.
The fort in its centre, the houses, the streets were filled with
fugitives from the surrounding regions. The Indians, for once
bound together in unity by the eloquence of Pontiac, had begun
the work of murder, and had attacked the settlements of the
frontier from Detroit to the Susquehanna. Carlisle and Bedford
were places of refuge for the panic-stricken inhabitants. Later
in the month Colonel Bouquet set forth from this town, where
we are now assembled, with a little army of five hundred sol
diers to relieve Fort Pitt. As the Scotch Highlanders marched
out upon the main road westward, the people watched their
receding ranks with many misgivings of their coming fate. In
a few months Bouquet returned victorious to Carlisle, bringing
with him wives and children who had been snatched by the
Indians from their .homes in this valley, but were now restored
again. The many affecting scenes of the restoration, of the
recognition by each other of relatives long parted, have been
much dwelt upon by the local historians of the County of
Cumberland.
This was in 1763. In 1783, just twenty years after, it was
resolved by wise and good men, the leaders of public opinion
in the Commonwealth, to found in this same borough of
Carlisle, so lately one of the frontier posts of civilization, a
school of learning. It was a bold undertaking, and yet it
sagaciously forecasted the future. It was bold, for in the mean
time the war of the Revolution had followed the war of Pontiac.
The country was exhausted; trade had been deranged by enor
mous issues of paper money; the thirteen colonies, now states,
loosely held together by the Articles of Confederation, were
without real political unity; Washington had not yet surren
dered his commission as commander-in-chief of the American
armies; the treaty of peace with Great Britain had not yet
been ratified by Congress. Before, therefore, the country had
adjusted itself to its new position, the founders of Dickinson
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1
College had begun their beneficent task. Indeed, this was, in
their minds, a leading part of the adjustment of the country to
the new conditions of its life. “Whereas,” they declare in the
College charter, “ the happiness and prosperity of every country
depends much on the right education of the youth, who must
succeed the aged in the important offices of society, and the
most exalted nations have acquired their pre-eminence by the
virtuous principles and liberal knowledge instilled into the
minds of the rising generation.
“And, Whereas, After a long and bloody contest with a
great and powerful kingdom, it has pleased Almighty God to
restore to the United States of America the blessings of a general
peace, whereby the good people of this State, relieved from the
burthens of war, are placed in a condition to attend to useful
arts, sciences and literature, &c., &c.
“Be it therefore enacted, That there be erected and hereby is
erected and established in the borough of Carlisle, in the County
of Cumberland, in this State, a college for the education of
youth in the learned and foreign languages, the useful arts,
sciences and literature, the style, name and title of which said
college shall be as is hereafter mentioned and defined.
“That is to say, (1.) In memory of the great and important
services rendered to his country by his Excellency, John Dick
inson, President of the Supreme Executive Council, and in
commemoration of his very liberal donation to the institution,
the said college shall forever hereafter be called and known by
the name of Dickinson College.”
The “forever” of the charter has thus far been made good,
and after a hundred years of vicissitude the college named of
John Dickinson still stands and welcomes another generation,
here gathered to celebrate with appropriate honors its centennial
day.
At this time Pennsylvania was living under its provisional
constitution framed in 1776; there was as yet no wagon-road
over the Alleghanies, and, not till several years after 1783, a
mail from Philadelphia to Pittsburg. The active mind of Dr.
Benjamin Rush had, however, already conceived the plan of a
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complete system of education for the State. In an address to
the Legislature, presented in 1786, he gives its outlines: “Let
there be one university in the State, and let this be established
in the capital (Philadelphia). Let law, physic, divinity, the
law of nature and nations, and economy, &c., be taught in it by
public lectures, in the winter season, after the manner of Euro
pean universities, and let the professors receive such salaries
from the State as will enable them to deliver their lectures at a
moderate price. Let there be four colleges, one at Philadelphia,
one at Carlisle, a third, for the benefit of our German citizens,
at Lancaster, and a fourth, some years hence, at Pittsburg. In
these colleges let young men be instructed in mathematics,
and in the higher branches of science, in the same manner that
they are now taught in our American colleges. After they
have received a testimonial from one of these colleges, let them,
if they can afford it, complete their studies, spending a season
or two in attending the lectures in the university. Let there
be free schools established in every township or district consist
ing of one hundred families. By this plan, the whole State will
be tied together by one system of education. The university
will in time furnish masters for the colleges, and the colleges
will furnish masters for the free schools, while the free schools
will in.their turn supply the colleges and the university with
scholars, students and pupils.”
Such was the scheme, broad and comprehensive, of which
Dickinson College was a part. It drew for its realization
largely upon the future; but these men knew themselves to
be the founders of a State and provided intelligently for the
years to come.
Yet it was none the less the purpose of Dr. Rush that the
College should be Presbyterian. In a paper from his pen,
entitled “ Hints for Establishing a College at Carlisle,” dated
Philadelphia, September 3d, 1782, he writes thus: “Every re
ligious society should endeavor to preserve a representation of
itself in government. The Presbyterians suffered greatly under
the old government from the want of this representation. At
present they hold an undue share in the power of Pennsylvania.
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They have already excited the jealousy of other societies, and
powerful combinations are forming against them. To secure a
moderate and just share of the power of the State, it becomes
them to retire a little from office, and to invite other societies to
partake of these with them. To prevent the effect of these com
binations against them, reducing them to their ancient state of
oppression and insignificance, it becomes them above all things
to entrench themselves in schools of learning. These are the
true nurseries of power and influence. In the present pleni
tude of the power of the Presbyterians let them obtain a charter
for a college in Carlisle. The advantages of a college at Carlisle
are:—1. It will draw the Presbyterians to one common centre
of union. 2. It will be nearly central to the State, and will
command the youth of the new and growing western counties
and perhaps states. Let all the trustees, as well as the principal
of the college and its professors, be Presbyterians. This will
be necessary in order to connect religion and learning; in the
present constitution of things religion cannot be inculcated
without a system or form of some kind.” In accord with
this scheme a petition to the Legislature was drawn up and
signed by sundry inhabitants of Cumberland County, asking
for a college charter. Among the signers are Blair, Snodgrass,
Johnston, Gordon, McMillan and James Crooks.
In all the movement to prepare the way for the securing of
a charter, as well as in the care of the college, after the charter
was granted, Dr. Rush was the master spirit. He writes to
Montgomery, to Armstrong, to the leaders of the Presbytery of
Carlisle, he conducts the negotiations with Dr. Nisbet, he wel
comes Nisbet to America, he sends forward suggestions to Car
lisle for the proper reception of the principal of the college
there, he procures subscriptions to the funds, books, philosophi
cal apparatus, cheers the despondent, urges on every measure of
progress, and ceases not in his labor of love until death. May
20th, 1783, he issues a paper entitled “ Reasons Against Founding
a College at Carlisle,” intended to meet with irony the sectarian
opposition to the obtaining of a charter. Among the reasons is
the following: “A college at Carlisle, from its situation, will
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necessarily fall into the hands of the Presbyterians, who are a
most intolerant set of people, and who should not be permitted
to herd together, lest they should awaken the jealousies of other
religious societies, who are at present universally in love with
Presbyterian manners, character and government, insomuch that
in a few years (if Dr. Kush and two or three other hot-headed
fanatics do not prevent it) the whole State, and especially the
Tories and Quakers, will accept the Presbyterian religion.”
Thus the first opposing force encountered by the founders of
the College was sectarian jealousy. Dr. Rush, however, held
firmly to his fundamental principles, that “learning without
religion does real mischief to the morals of mankind,” and that
religion is best supported under the patronage of particular
societies. Ultimately the plans were so far modified that, while
Presbyteriarf control was secured, other religious bodies were
represented, in the Board of Trustees. “The design,” writes
Dr. Rush, March 19th, 1783, “is equally patronized by men of
every political and religious party in the frontier counties of
Pennsylvania. The trustees (who have been named) have been
drawn equally from Constitutionalists and Republicans, from
Old and New Lights. And still farther to remove all jealousies
respecting the Presbyterians, five dr six of the trustees are taken
from the English and Lutheran churches.” Thus, like a wise
general, did Dr. Rush harmonize differences and keep the forces
on which he depended well together. The president of the
State, John Dickinson, a Quaker of the warlike type, was
placed at the head of the Board of Trustees.
In these initial trials of the College Dr. Rush hovered over
it with a watchful, brooding love. He writes to General Mont
gomery in 1783: “I rejoice to find you in such good spirits
with respect to our College. It will, it must prosper.” His
mind rests, with fondness of recollection, upon the spot where
he and the General first discussed the project. In 1784 he
makes the memorandum: “The first conversation upon the sub
ject of a college at Carlisle between J. Montgomery and B.
Rush took place at Mr. Bingham’s porch.” Now and then a
letter or a postscript is playfully signed “Bingham’s Porch,” as
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though that had been a trysting place where two noble souls
had pledged themselves to each other to do this good work for
the Church and the State. Referring to the opposition encoun
tered, he writes to Montgomery, near the end of 1784: “I well
remember the inscription over the Foundling Hospital in Paris,—
‘My father and my mother have abandoned me, but the Lord
hath taken care of me.’ Let this be the motto of our college.”
And still again, early in 1785: “Give up our college? God
forbid! No, not if every trustee in the board (half a dozen
excepted) perjured himself by deserting or neglecting his trust.
The reasons and advantages of a college at Carlisle appear the
same to me as they did in the year 1782, when we first pro
jected it. We must succeed.” His form of speech is suggestive
of deep affection; it is never the college, but “ our collegehe
had taken it to his heart of hearts.
*
As we are here to do honor to the memory of the founders
of Dickinson College, let us pause and dwell for a moment
longer upon the evidences which time has preserved of their
religious spirit. It is customary to contrast the coldness of the
religious life of the eighteenth century with the fervors of the
nineteenth, but the faithful Christians of the former period
fought an unflinching battle with Deism, and among the most
uncompromising in the assertion of their faith were Rush and
Dickinson. “I prefer,” says Dickinson, in a note to the Letters
of Fabius, “the broadcloth of a Locke or a Lardner to the
cobwebs of a Hume or a Gibbon.” “The only foundation,”
says Rush, in his address to the Legislature, “for a useful
education in a republic is laid in religion. The religion I
mean to recommend in this place is the religion of the New
Testament.” In another essay, he defends the use of the Bible
in schools. “The present fashionable practice,” he writes, “of
rejecting the Bible from our schools, I suspect, has originated
with the deists. They discover great ingenuity in their new
method of attacking Christianity. If they proceed in it they
will do more in half a century in extirpating religion, than
Bolingbroke or Voltaire could have effected in a thousand years.”
And then he adds a sentiment which is as useful for the State
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of Pennsylvania to-day, as it was a century ago: “ On the ground
of the good old custom of using the Bible as a school-book, it
becomes us to entrench our religion.” The founders of Dickin
son College had a clear prevision of what would come of the
inroads of the deism, then fashionable; they intended this
school to be a home of New Testament Christianity, and they
embodied their faith in their corporate seal, “Pietate et Doetrina,
tuta Libertas.” In their system of thought, religion and liberty
were connected by the closest ties. “A Christian,” writes Rush,
“ cannot fail of being a republican, for every precept of the Gospel
inculcates those degrees of humility, self-denial and brotherly
kindness which are directly opposed to the pride of monarchy and
the pageants of a court.” The founders of Dickinson College
understood their time; they knew that a great future was before
them, and iff all their thoughts and plans they linked together
that blessed, indissoluble trinity—religion, learning, liberty.
Such were our founders as Christians; the country has for
the century past honored their virtues as patriots. Rush was a
signer of the Declaration of Independence, and but for a doubt
of the expediency of the Declaration at that precise moment,
Dickinson would have been also. Dickinson had helped to
prepare the country for separation from Great Britain by his
“Farmer’s Letters.” Writing under the guise of a prosperous
cultivator of the soil, he so won the people by his argument
that every letter was hailed with expressions of joy. There
are passages in these immortal writings of Demosthenic vigor.
In all the productions of his pen given to the country during the
Revolutionary period, Dickinson is fully abreast of Jefferson
himself; in cogency of reasoning and in fiery appeal he is
second to no man of his time. The conclusion of the Farmer’s
seventh letter sounds like a trumpet peal: “ These duties which
will inevitably be levied upon us are expressly levied for the
sole purpose of taking money. This is the definition of taxes.
They are therefore taxes. The money is to be taken from us.
We are therefore taxed. Those who are taxed without their
consent, expressed by themselves or their representatives, are
slaves. We are taxed without our own consent, expressed by
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ourselves or by our representatives. We are, therefore, slaves«2
With such lucid statement the people could not fail to compre
hend what taxation by the British Crown meant. But more
stirring still, and equalling the Declaration of Independence in
vigor, was the Declaration of the Colonies drawn up by Dick
inson, and adopted July 6th, 1775, in which were set forth the
causes and the necessity of taking up arms. “We are reduced,”
says this memorable paper, “to the alternative of making an
unconditional submission to the tyranny of irritated ministers
or resistance by force. The latter is our choice. We have
COUNTED THE COST OF THE CONTEST AND FIND NOTHING SO
slavery.
Honor, peace and
humanity forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which
we have received from our gallant ancestors, and which our
innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot
endure the infamy of resigning succeeding generations to that
dreadful as voluntary
~i)
wretchedness which inevitably awaits them if we basely entail
hereditary bondage upon them. With hearts fortified by these
animating reflections, we most solemnly before God and the
world declare, that, exerting the utmost energy of those powers
which our beneficent Creator hath graciously bestowed upon
us, the arms we have been compelled by our enemies to assume
we will, in defiance of every hazard, with unabating firmness,
employ for the preservation of our liberties, being with one mind
resolved to die freemen, rather than to live slaves.” When this
Declaration was read to Putnam’s division of the Continental
army, on Prospect Hill, near Boston, “they shouted,” says the
historian, “in three huzzas, a loud Amen.” Thus did Dickinson
point the meaning of the spirit of resistance which had shown
the first pulsations of its vigor in the battle of Bunker Hill,
three weeks before.
But there was a beginning before this beginning. Our
founders had a spiritual ancestry which should be named with
reverence to-day. Princeton, Dickinson, Jefferson, Hampden
Sydney, and Washington Colleges are all the fruits of a little
seed sowed in the soil of Pennsylvania, the early part of the
eighteenth century. They are the progeny of the Log College,
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established in Bucks County by the elder Tennent. Let us
gather together the elements of this picture. Mr. Tennent, a
native of Ireland and a thoroughly trained classical scholar,
settled in Neshaminy, about twenty miles north of Philadel
phia, in the year 1726. Solicitous for the training of ministers
to serve the Presbyterian churches, he built near by his home, a
log house, and there taught sacred and classical learning to the
end of his life. Hither came Whitefield, who found in Tennent
a congenial spirit. “ The place,” writes Whitefield, in his journal,
“ is, in contempt, called the College. It is a log house, about
twenty feet long, and as many broad; and to me it seemed to
resemble the schools of the old prophets, for their habitations
were mean; and that they sought not great things for themselves
is plain from those passages of Scripture wherein we are told
that each of them took a beam to build them a house.” Hither
too came Beatty, afterwards a founder of Princeton, carrying
his pedlar’s pack, and astonishing the head of the college, by
addressing him in correct Latin. Hither came Samuel Blair,
who, entering the Presbyterian ministry, followed the example
of his preceptor, and established a school at Fagg’s Manor, in
this State, where he trained the Rev. Samuel Davies, afterwards
president of Princeton. Hither came John Blair, afterwards
vice-president of Princeton, and Professor of Divinity. Hither
too, if tradition may be trusted, came Samuel Finley, who in
turn founded a school in Nottingham, Pennsylvania, where he
educated in the classics Dr. Benjamin Rush, and James Waddell,
famous as “the blind preacher” of Virginia, and ended his life
in the presidency of Princeton. Here were to be found, by
natural right, the sons of the principal, all of them preachers,
and one of them, Gilbert Tennent, the organizer of a Presby
terian church in Philadelphia, “chiefly composed of those who
were denominated converts and followers of Mr. Whitefield.”
To the school of Samuel Blair, in Fagg’s Manor, came Robert
Smith, who, after entering the ministry of the Presbyterian
Church, founded at Pequea, in Lancaster County, another
school of the prophets, after the model of the Log College.
From this school went forth Samuel Stanhope Smith, the
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founder of Hampden Sydney College and Professor of Moral
Philosophy in Princeton, and John Blair Smith, first president
of Union College, Schenectady, New York. From the school
of Blair, at Fagg’s Manor, went John McMillan, the pioneer
of Presbyterianism in Western Pennsylvania and the father
of Jefferson College. These men founded Log Colleges after
the pattern of the humble structure on the Neshaminy.
McMillan trained in his, hard by his home, one hundred
ministers. Joseph Smith, another pioneer of Presbyterianism
in Western Pennsylvania and a graduate of Princeton, opened
his school of the prophets in a kitchen adjoining his dwelling,
cheerfully surrendered by his wife for the purpose. This kitchen
was the seed out of which Jefferson College grew.
Nor did the zeal for learning terminate with the founders of
these schools; their students were as»ardent in devotion to
knowledge as their teachers. While the Hampden Sydney
College building was in preparation, the young men in attend
ance put up huts and booths for themselves while pursuing
their studies, and sitting on planks construed their Greek and
Latin and worked their problems in Mathematics. Such zeal
carries us back to the days of Abelard and the Paraclete, with
his thousands of students housed in rude huts about his mon
astery. The Log College graduates and their associates of the
Presbyterian ministry worked with an intensity which rapidly
consumed them. Few of them lived bevond sixty-five years,
many of them died young. They were teachers of classical
and sacred learning, preachers, and men of unfaltering courage
in times of peril. Such was Duffield, whose church at Mona
han, ten miles from Carlisle, was protected by ramparts, on
which sentinels stood while the congregation worshipped. Such
was Elder, of Paxton and Derry, who preached with his rifle
beside him in the pulpit, and whose congregation were often
attacked by lurking Indians, when on the way from church to
their homes. They were as strong for liberty as they were for
learning and religion. Tt is but simple justice to say that the
Scotch-Irish preachers of Pennsylvania, all of them of the
Presbyterian faith, were the leaders of their people in the
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conflict with Great Britain, and the people trained by them were
worthy of their ministers. The men of Cumberland County
were among the first to condemn in public meeting the closing
of the port of Boston by the British Crown. Immediately
after the battle of Lexington, the county mustered fifteen hun
dred armed men, from which number several companies were
chosen during the summer of 1775 to go to Boston, as a part
of Washington’s army there. “They were,” say the local historian, “men for the times, inured to toil and exposure, stout
and athletic. They were soldiers who could march, when an
emergency required, without tents or baggage-wagons, carrying
their equipments in their knapsacks. With a blanket they
could sleep on the bare earth, with the open air for their apart
ment, and the sky for their covering. Many of these men are
known to have remained, from that time, in the military service
of their country for years, and some of them till Independence
was acknowledged and the army was disbanded; others had in
other colonies a soldier’s burial and grave.”*
If we have traced this history with clearness, it will have been
seen that from the Log College of Neshaminy proceeded the
Presbyterian Log Colleges which during the Colonial period
dotted the central and western regions of this State. From
the humble school of the elder Tennent also proceeded the
collegiate system of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and the valley
of Virginia. “The ministers,” says Dr. Archibald Alexander,
“who exerted themselves in the establishment of the New Jersey
College, were all the friends of the Log College, and most of
them had received their training, both in classical and in
theological learning, within the walls of that humble institution.
Besides Dickinson and Burr, who were graduates of Yale, the
other friends and founders of Nassau Hall are the Tennents,
Blairs, Finley, Smith, Rogers, Davies and others, who had
received their education in the Log College, or in schools
instituted by those who had been instructed there.”f
* Tribute to the Irish and Scotch Early Settlers of Pennsylvania, by George Chambers,
page 95.
f The Log College, pages 82-3.
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The debt which this country owes to the Scotch-Irish Pres
byterians has not been understood, much less acknowledged..
They, in their synod which met in Philadelphia in 1775,
were the first religious body “ to declare themselves in favor of
open resistance” to the king; they issued the first Declaration
of Independence, that of Mecklenburg, May 20th, 1775. They
were, as we have seen, the founders of the schools of learning in
the Middle States and, notably, the founders of Dickinson College.
They were rugged men and could handle with equal power the
sword of the spirit and the sword of steel. Aggressive and
indomitable though they were, they were, for all, lovers of peace,
for they knew well that learning and religion thrive best where
peace reigns. Their love of learning was a deep religious
passion, inspired by the desire to furnish to the then new country
a cultured ministry. They carried in their minds the ideal of a
lofty civilization, and amid the rigors of frontier life established
the beginnings of the culture which adorns society in its most
advanced stage. In their plan of life, the fort which warded
off Indian assaults, the Church, and the classical school were
mingled together and contemporary. Compelled by the neces
sities of their times, they fought with the one hand and built
with the other. Before the sounds of tlAs savage war-whoop
had quite died away, their chosen sons were construing Demos
thenes in the Greek’, and Moses in the Hebrew. Their history
has as yet been but imperfectly told; but the time will come,
when the Scotch-Irish Presbyterian of Pennsylvania will take
his place alongside of the New England Puritan, as one of the
founders of learning and liberty in the New World. The race
which has given to the country John Witherspoon, Alexander
Hamilton, James Wilson, Andrew Jackson, Robert Fulton,
Horace Greeley, and others of equal or lesser fame, is one whose
memory men cannot willingly let die.
At the precise point of time when Dickinson College was
chartered, John Witherspoon, a Scotchman by birth, a descend
ant of John Knox, a fellow-student in Edinburgh of Blair
and Robertson, was president of Princeton; John Ewing, an
American Presbyterian of Irish descent, was Provost of the
�17
University of Pennsylvania; John Blair Smith, an American
Presbyterian, also of Irish descent, was president of Hampden
Sydney College in Virginia. Presbyterian preachers, mostly of
Irish lineage, were organizing the schools which, in time, became
Washington and Jefferson Colleges. James Waddell, whom
Wirt has immortalized, Irish born and Log College bred, was
preaching and teaching in Virginia. The shaping of the liberal
culture of the Middle States was in the hands of ScotchIrish Presbyterians. What more natural than that the founders
of Dickinson College should look to Scotland for a principal of
the new school ? Dr. Rush, when a student at Edinburgh, had
negotiated, in 1767, the transfer of Witherspoon to America.
Witherspoon had at first declined the nomination to the presi
dency of Princeton, and had recommended in his place his
friend, the Rev. Charles Nisbet, “as the fittest man of all his
acquaintance to be the head of a college.” The two were close
friends, Witherspoon being fourteen years the elder. Subse
quently the refusal, was reconsidered and Witherspoon accepted
the invitation to Nassau Hall, where he lived, from 1768 to
1794, a life of great usefulness and honor. Who should so
readily occur to Dr. Rush in his eager effort to procure a suit
able head for Dickinson as Dr. Nisbet? One fact recommended
Nisbet: he had, during the war of the Revolution, been a warm
friend of the cause of the Thirteen Colonies; moreover, he be
longed to the party in the Presbyterianism of Scotland which
most nearly coincided with the New Side party of Presbyterians
in America. At home he had attained great fame as a scholar;
his pupil, Dr. Miller, of Princeton, says of him, that he was
“ regarded as among the most learned men of Scotland.” Even
there he was frequently called “The Walking Library,” an
epithet applied to him as frequently during his life in the United
States. An extraordinary facility in the acquisition of knowl
edge was supplemented by an equally extraordinary retentive
ness of memory. Besides being critically versed in Greek,
Latin and Hebrew, he read with facility French, German,
Italian, Spanish and Portuguese. His attainments in theology
made him the peer of the foremost among Scotch theologians.
�18
An affluent wit gave its charm to his conversation, while his
fine social qualities had secured him a circle of choice friends,
among whom were some wearers of lordly titles. In Scotland
he was faultlessly adjusted to his position, a position without
privations, affording useful labors, ample facilities for study and
a life in the midst of all the refinements of culture. To give up
these for the rawness and newness of a life in a nation just born,
a school just chartered, amid associations which could but im
perfectly replace those left behind him, demanded a largeness
of sacrifice to which he cheerfully yielded his consent, but
which it is clear now, he only imperfectly understood. What
ever reluctance he may have had to accept the new position was
overcome by the enthusiasm of Dr. Rush, who saw only a smil
ing future before both the College and the nation. In their
frequent letters to each other, every point was canvassed and
every consideration that could influence the mind of Dr. Nisbet
received ample justice from Dr. Rush’s facile pen. Dr. Rush
had, no doubt, before his mind the career of Nisbet’s friend,
Witherspoon, the scholar, the patriot, the mighty man in word
and deed. Though but eleven years in the Colonies when the
war of the Revolution began, Witherspoon had become an
American of Americans, had signed the Declaration of Inde
pendence; and had uttered words, so courageous in its defence
that they will be repeated for centuries to come. Peace had
returned and the wise master-builder was wanted again. Dr.
Nisbet was the chosen man.
By the time of Dr. Nisbet’s arrival, the expectations cher
ished of him by the trustees of the College, had spread through
out the State. Had he been a prince, or ambassador from
Prance, our friendly ally, his coming could not have created
greater pleasure. I find in the Pennsylvania Gazette, of July
20th, 1785, this description, by a correspondent, of the reception
given him as he approached Carlisle: “On Monday, July 4th,
the Rey. Dr. Charles Nisbet, principal of Dickinson College,
arrived at this place.’ He was met with his family at the
Spring Forge, five miles from the town, by near one hundred
ladies and gentlemen, about two o’clock, when, being introduced
�19
x
to the whole company, they sat down to an elegant entertain
ment in a bower erected for the purpose. The afternoon was
spent in the most agreeable manner, each of the company seem
ing to vie with others, in attention and congratulations to the
Doctor and his family. In the evening they all rode into town
together. The next day the Professors of the College conducted
the students in procession to the church, where they were met
by the Doctor and the principal inhabitants of the village.
After the company was seated, Mr. Ross, the Professor of Lan
guages, rose and delivered a Latin address to the Doctor, con
gratulating him on his safe arrival, and anticipating the great
advantages to the College and the State from his taking charge
of that institution. This was followed by an English address
to the Doctor by Mr. John Montgomery, Jr., one of the students
of the College. The joy manifested by the whole village in
seeing the completion of their wishes respecting the establish
ment of the College, by the arrival of Dr. Nisbet may more
easily be conceived than described. Indeed, if we may be
allowed to form a judgment of the future importance of the
College from the great politeness and hospitality with which
the Doctor was received and treated at Lancaster, at Yorktown,
and the whole country through which he passed on his way to
this town, from the Doctor’s abilities, extensive learning and
amiable manners, from the late and rapid increase of the num
ber of students, and from the natural situation of the College,
there can be little doubt of Dickinson College rivaling in a few
years, both in reputation and in number of students, the oldest
seminaries on the continent.”
A beautiful Idyl! We are for the moment in Arcadia, where
Apollo, god of light, tunes his lute and peace smiles and reigns.
It was the scholar’s triumphal progress, a tribute to learning
by the plain people of the county of Cumberland. Here, too,
Dr. Rush’s active mind had anticipated every possible event.
He had written to his friend Montgomery, “ Would it not be
well to ring the court-house bell on Dr. Nisbet’s arrival?”
The people of the borough did much more, in the way of
showing honor, as we have seen. Dr. Nisbet soon found that
�20
i
whatever was needed to give permanence to the College was yet]
to be done, that its money resources were slender, that he must
encounter all the trials of a builder who has yet to lay his
corner-stone,—in short, that he was in a new world. It is no
disparagement of his many fine qualities to say that he was
not fitted for the work of a pioneer. He was refined, sensitive,
unused to dealing with men of all sorts and conditions. He
was a total stranger to the hardy self-reliance so characteristic of
American life. Unfortunately too, his home was assigned him
at the Barracks, and he was thereby shut out from close contact
with society. The uncurbed Letort Spring at that time over
flowed the lowlands on either side of its channel. He was
soon prostrated by fever, and while suffering from consequent
low spirits offered his resignation, which was reluctantly accepted.
In his letter of resignation, he says of himself: “ I hope the
/ trustees will consider the great loss I have sustained in health
and circumstances, being without a charge in a distant country,
unable to fulfil or remove myself at my own expense, and
having no benefice to return to.”
The letters of Dr. Nisbet to Dr. Rush during 1785-6 must
have been exasperating to that large-hearted philanthropist.
From the first Dr. Nisbet’s wife and children were dissatisfied. In
the month of his arrival at Carlisle h£ writes to Rush: “My wife
and children are unhappy and laying plans to return to Scot
land and to convey me thither. I know not where this will
end. Perhaps all emigrants are uneasy for some time, even
when they recover afterwards. When I consider my present
position I am often filled with melancholy, and consider myself
a deposed minister, a deserter of my charge.” He complains
that fever has almost destroyed his memory and weakened the
activity of his other faculties of mind. “Yet,” he adds, “it
perplexes and grieves me to be obliged to leave a people who
are so kind, and among whom I promised myself so much
satisfaction.” By September, 1785, his letters to Dr. Rush
betray much irritation. “The meanest thing I know,” he
writes, “is to decoy a poor man out of a peaceable and estab
lished station, into a climate like a frying-pan, and then bid him
�21
kill himself if he is the least uneasy.” And in the same month
again: “I only wish to get quietly and as quickly as possible
out of the country.” He negotiated for a ship to carry him
home again; and but for the fact that he would not sail in one
commanded by an Irish captain, would have sailed in the winter
of’85-6. By the spring of 1786 his health had rallied, and he
consented to a re-election. With heroic purpose he addressed
himself to the duties of his position, suppressing his disgust and
showing an example of herculean energy in work. Without
appearing to overtax himself he carried on concurrent lectures
in Moral Philosophy, Logic, Philosophy of the mind, BellesLettres and systematic Theology, teaching after the method of the
Scotch universities, which must have been imperfectly adapted
to the raw and untrained youth under his charge. His lectures,
some of which are preserved in the College and Ridgway
libraries, ranged over the whole field of ancient and modern
learning. To me Dr. Nisbet is most admirable in this, that
under circumstances so depressing he stood manfully to his task,
and remitted not his devotion to the College till death gave him
rest. He saw and spoke freely of the defective condition of
higher education in the United States. In November, 1786,
he presents a formal report to the trustees: “ There are forty
students in the grammar school; besides these, twenty attend
the Professor of Mathemattics, and have begun the study of
Natural Philosophy. The same twenty attend the Professor of
geography, chronology and history as much as their attend
ance on the other classes will permit, and lately began the study
of Logic and Metaphysics as a preparation for that of Moral
Philosophy. The students are in great want of books, as none
fit for their use are sold here.” From these facts Dr. Nisbet
draws an unfavorable augury of the future of the College, and
expresses the opinion that the academy at York, and the gram
mar school at Hagerstown “already surpass it in popularity.”
From his letters to his intimate friend, Judge Allison, of Pitts
burg, we also get glimpses of his inner feelings and the hardy
courage with which he held on his way. Writing to the Judge
in 1792, he gives this account of himself: “My occupation is
�22
/
to read lectures on Logic, Metaphysics and Moral Philosophy, to
which I premise a short account of the Greek and Latin classics,
a course of lectures on the History of Philosophy and another
on Criticism. I sometimes explain a classic critically in the
beginning, before the class is fully assembled. We have a sort
of four classes, though as most of our students are at their own
disposal, they attend several at the same time. You may be sure
our lectures are very imperfect, for we are yet in the day of
small things. I have only mentioned this summary for your
own private satisfaction, as I would not wish it to be known in
Scotland what poor doings we are about in America.”
All this must have been depressing to the trustees, yet Dr.
Rush was not depressed. No lack of good fortune could chill
the fervor of his zeal. He knew that America was not Europe,
and that there must be seed sowing and culture before the
harvest is gathered in. The resignation and discontent of Dr.
Nisbet were a heavy blow to him, but he bated not one jot of
heart or hope. Unquestionably Dr. Nisbet was a century in
advance of his fellow-citizens here; it has required the century
to enable us to reach the ideal he had in his mind. Princeton
is just founding her school of philosophy; the University of
Pennsylvania is becoming more and more a true university;
the Johns Hopkins School would not have been possible even
fifty years ago. Dr. Nisbet was harassed, too, by the narrow
views of higher education held by many of the trustees whom
he served. If he chafed under the hard necessities of his posi
tion, it was very human. Let us to-day do honor to his memory,
and resolve not to rest till the College is made all he wished it
to be.
Though, in its administration, Presbyterian, Dickinson College
was not distinctively a church institution. It was founded for
the benefit of the State, and to the State its founders looked for
aid. Pennsylvania was then an inchoate commonwealth; it had
been for nearly a century governed jointly by a popular assem
bly and the representatives of the descendants of Penn. Carlisle
had been surveyed and laid out under proprietary authority; at
that time all the region westward of the new borough, was liter
�23
,
ally Penn’s woods. The State was poor, yet out of its poverty
it gave help to this school of learning, whose life was to be
interwoven with its own destinies. The grant of the charter
was soon followed by a gift of money and of ten thousand
acres of land; before the close of the century still other gifts
followed. In 1826, in a season of dire extremity for the College,
the legislature voted a grant of $3000 yearly for seven years.
Without being committed by any pledge or covenant to the
support of Dickinson, Pennsylvania was its fosterer, and for all
that the good old Commonwealth has done for us we desire to
record our grateful thanks on this centennial day. That the
bond between the State and College was intended to be close is
seen in the history of the period. The language of the charter
shows it, the oath taken under the charter by every trustee to
be true and faithful to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
shows it, the constant reference of the founders of the College
to its influence on the State’s future shows it. Rush, in all
his planning for higher culture, was planning for the rearing of
great citizens for a great commonwealth. His ideal was a loftier
one than we have yet reached, but the service of the State gave
his ideal color and form. In his essay, addressed to the legis
lature, on “ The Modes of Education Proper for a Republic,” he
speaks with the loftiness of a seer: “Let our pupil be taught
that he does not belong to himself but that he is public property.
Let him be taught to love his family, but let him be taught at
the same time, that he must forsake and even forget them when
the welfare of his country requires it. He must watch for the
State as if its liberties depended on his vigilance alone, but he
must do this in such a manner as not to defraud his creditors
or neglect his family. He must love private life, but he must
decline no station, however public or responsible it may be, when
called to it by the suffrages of his fellow-citizens. He must love
popularity, but he must despise it when set in competition with
the dictates of his judgment or the real interests of his country.
He must love character and must have a due sense of injuries, but
he must be taught to appeal only to the laws of the State to
defend the one, and punish the other. He must love family
�24
honor, but he must be taught that neither the rank nor the
antiquity of his ancestors can command respect without personal
merit. He must avoid neutrality on all questions that divide
the State, but he must shun the rage and acrimony of party
spirit. He must be taught to love his fellow-creatures in every
part of the world, but he must cherish with a more intense and
peculiar affection the citizens of Pennsylvania and the United
States.”
We have departed far from this ideal, but it may do us good
to gaze on it for a moment. We have been in some respects,
during the century, narrower than Rush and Dickinson and
their coadjutors, but we are broadening our views again.
Their scheme was impracticable; it was not possible even for
good men in a board of college trustees to rid themselves of
political and sectarian jealousies. The care of higher education
has passed from the State to the churches, and instead of a State
we have a churchly system. Nothing less than this change
could satisfy the intense religious spirit of our c^itury. We
have gained- much thereby and perhaps have lost something.
The growth of a true university system has no doubt been
retarded, but the moral and religious culture of young men
has been more certainly assured. The gifts of single citizens
for higher learning have reached a largeness which the State
could not possibly have reached a century ago, and which the
State even now does not emulate. We look now to private
bounty to do what the State did but imperfectly when Dick
inson received its charter, and we do not look in vain; Some
thing has been lost, however, of the fervor of citizenship, of the
sense of obligation to enter into the service of the State, of the
recognition of the claims of public duty upon all cultured men.
Our ideal and that of our fathers are similar but not the same.
They would build up the citizen; we, the man. They were
intensely political; we, except in great crises of fate, everything
but political. They dreamed the dream of a common people
swayed by the educated few; we have realized the fact of a
common people thinking for themselves, and deciding of them-j
selves, the State’s destiny. Perhaps the true mean will be found,
�25
in time, between our fathers’ scheme of life and that of their
sons. At all events let us be duly thankful to-day to the dear
old Commonwealth, in whose bracing air of freedom our college
has, for a century, lived. For all the help of the State, for all
its loving care of Dickinson College, we desire to-day to record
our gratitude.
In 1798, the present College campus was bought of the Penn
family for one hundred and fifty dollars. Until then, the work
of teaching had been done in a small two-story house on Bedford
Street near Liberty Alley. On the ground thus purchased the
plan, discussed for several years, of erecting a suitable building
was carried into effect. In 1792, Dr. Nisbet had expressed
serious doubts of the expediency of erecting a permanent struc
ture in Carlisle. He writes to Dr. Rush: “ I have no private
ends to serve in wishing that the students might have proper ac
commodations, and that the College were in such a situation as
to admit of increase, which, I think, cannot be the case if it is
established in this dirty town, where students must wade through
deep mud several times a day at the risk of their health, and
afterwards be cooped up like pigs, in narrow apartments and
mean houses, and in such numbers in one room as renders it
almost impossible for them to continue their studies.” He is
scandalized by the fact that “in the town there are pools that
could float a boat.” On this point, the trustees thought more
wisely than the College Principal, and the building was erected,
but just at the point of completion it was burned down, Feb
ruary, 1803. Nassau Hall, Princeton, was destroyed by fire
very shortly before. Dr. Nisbet, who was in this period of his
administration bitter against the trustees, on account of the tardy
payment of the salaries of the faculty, writes of the event to
his friend Judge Allison, in this strain: “You must have heard
that our New College was burned down on the 3d current. We
had been bothered by our trustees to make our College conform
to Princeton College. We have now attained a pretty near con
formity to it, by having our new building burnt down to the
ground. But it could not stand, as it was founded in fraud and
knavery. I have been meditating on Jeremiah xxiii, 13,—
�26
‘Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and
his chambers by wrong; that useth his neighbor’s service without
wages, and giveth him not for his work.’ ” In August of the
same year, the corner-stone of a new edifice, the present West
College, was laid. Before its completion Dr. Nisbet died, after
a laborious service of nineteen years, July 18th, 1804. Thus
passed away a noble soul misplaced. Dr. Nisbet must have
often tried Rush’s temper, yet Dr. Rush says of him: “Few
such men have lived and died in any century.” In the midst
of an environment of circumstances, in many ways disagreeable
to him, still he fought the good fight and endured to the end.
Peace to the memory of the great scholar, preacher, theologian,
wit.
In reviewing the history just narrated, so full of the painful
experience of hope deferred, of imperfect sympathies, of honest
but unfortunate antagonisms, we must not fail to do justice to
the good and wise men, who planned and labored for this school
of learning. To Dr. Rush, of all the founders, belongs the
honored name of Father of Dickinson College. What buoyant
hopes were his! What unwavering love for the child of his
affections! In all the labors required, whether the collec
tion of funds, the choosing of professors, the details of manage
ment, his energy and zeal were conspicuous above the energy
and zeal of other men. His letters to the trustees, written when
he could not meet them, are full of the loving wisdom which
always wins the affection and support of one’s fellows. “ What
ever you conclude upon,” he writes in one letter, “shall find in
me the same support, as if it had been proposed by myself. I
have no will of my own in the great work of humanity in
which we are engaged.” And again : “ The difficulties in the
establishment of our College are now nearly at an end. We
have passed the Red Sea and the wilderness. A few of us have
been bitten by the fiery serpents in the way, but the conscious
ness of pure intentions has soon healed our wounds. We have
now nothing but the shallow waters of Jordan before us. One
more bold exertion will conduct us in safety and triumph to the
great objects of our hopes and wishes.” He appreciated the
�27
inconveniences which the faculty were compelled to bear, in the
narrow quarters where the College work was done, but exhorts
to patience: “The credit of our College will not be impaired
by our professors teaching in the school-house, which is, at
present, occupied by them. The foundation of the reputation of
the College of Princeton was laid in a private room at Newark,
by that great man of God, the Rev. Mr. Burr. It is said that
before the time of the Emperor Constantine, the churches had
wooden pulpits but golden ministers, but after he took Chris
tianity under his protection, the churches had golden pulpits but
wooden ministers. If we have golden professors, the frugal size
and humble appearance of our College will not prevent its
growth, or injure its reputation for study and useful learning.”
And again: “If there should be any deficiency of patience or
self-denial on the part of the teachers, let it be supplied out of
the stock of the public spirit of the trustees. Let us reflect
that we are doing infinitely less for our posterity than our
ancestors did for us, and that without their sacrifices, we should
never have known the inestimable advantages of religion and
learning. It has pleased God to call us into existence at an
important era. In such eras great men have been formed and
good men have delighted to live. Let us show ourselves worthy
of our present station in the country, and thank God for the
opportunity he has afforded us of imitating the example of the
Saviour of the world, by fresh acts of self-denial and benev
olence.”
The enthusiasm of Dr. Rush was needed, for dark days were
at hand. Dr. Nisbet was succeeded by the versatile Dr.
Davidson as pro tempore President. Could Dr. Davidson have
been induced to accept the principalship permanently, no doubt
the College would have bounded forward on a prosperous
career; but he preferred his pastorate at Carlisle, and decided to
devote himself wholly to that. The Rev. Jeremiah Atwater
was elected in 1809, and resigned in 1815 in consequence of col
lisions with the trustees in relation to internal discipline. All
the operations of the College were suspended from 1816 to
1821. During Dr. Atwater’s term of office, the brilliant
�28
Thomas Cooper held the chair of chemistry. It is difficult to
say what Thomas Cooper was not: English-born, and Oxford*]
bred, versed both in medicine and law, companion of French!
Girondists, an antagonist of Edmund Burke, a calico printer, a
practising lawyer, a judge, a college professor and then a college
president, he combined, like Priestley, devotion to physics,
with an accompanying interest in every study that touches
human welfare. His commentary on Justinian was issued
from his study in Carlisle, and may be claimed as one of the
contributions of Dickinson College to literature. His ability
was unquestioned, but his strong political prejudices made his
appointment distasteful to many of the lovers of learning in the
United States.
After an interval of five years, the College was reopened
with Dr. John M. Mason, one of the chiefs of Presbyterianism,
as Principal. It was a condition of his acceptance that he
should select his own Faculty. Henry Vethake became Pro
fessor of Natural Philosophy and Mathemetics, Alexander
McClelland of Belles-Lettres and Philosophy of the mind,
Joseph Spencer of Languages, and the Rev. Lewis Mayer of
History. This combination promised well, especially as the
State came forward with a grant of $10,000 in five annual pay
ments. Dr. Mason was in impaired health, having already had
two strokes of paralysis; he had accepted the post of Principal
in the hope that a change of climate and labor would restore
him. His hope was disappointed ; and in 1824 he resigned his
office, and retired wholly from public life. By the appointment
of the Rev. Lewis Mayer to the chair of History, the Theological
Seminary of the German Reformed Church was, for a time, con
nected with Dickinson College. “This event,” says Dr.
Gerhart, “marked the most important epoch in the history
of the German Reformed Church. It introduced a new ele
ment of power, which revived its energies, developed its re
sources, restored its theology, established its character, ex
tended its influence, and supplied it with able and efficient
ministers.” The combination existed till 1829, when the
Seminary was removed to Mercersburg, where Rauch, and
�29
Nevin, and Schaff made it illustrious. Of Dr. Mason’s faculty
none has left such a tradition of oratorical power as
McClelland. His fame still lingers in Cumberland County.
When announced to preach in the Presbyterian church of the
borough, seats, and aisles, and windows would be packed with
hearers, who listened with rapture to his brilliant rhetoric.
The chronic plague of the institution, the interference of the
trustees with the administration of discipline, still followed all
its steps. In the revised statutes of 1822, it was provided that
in all the cases adjudged by the Faculty to demand dismission or
expulsion, the facts should be presented in writing to the trus
tees, who alone had authority to determine whether the penalty
should be inflicted. The maintenance of order under such cir
cumstances was simply impossible.
Another statute sheds
light on the character of the times. It runs in these words:—
“ If any student shall fight or propose to fight a duel, or be in
any way concerned in promoting or abetting it, or in the giving
or accepting a challenge, or shall reproach, traduce or treat
contemptuously any student for having refused to accept a
challenge, he shall be expelled.” One duel, perhaps the only
one in the history of the College, fought in 1815, resulted in
the death of an only son, and this statute was probably a warn
ing against a repetition of the offence.
The prospects of the College were now dark indeed. The
Rev. Wm. Neill, a native of Western Pennsylvania, a graduate
of Princeton, and a successful Presbyterian pastor, was called to
the presidency. In his autobiography Dr. Neill rehearses his
difficulties with great simplicity and candor. Dr. Mason’s
resignation had shaken public confidence in the fortunes of
Dickinson. Funds were lacking, and only from forty to fifty
students were in attendance. “ An annual allowance,” says Dr.
Neill, “for the term of seven years, from the State treasury, was
obtained by dint of hard pleading and perseverance, by an act
of the Legislature, on condition that a report of the state of the
Institution should be laid before that body yearly, till the ex
piration of the said term.” Under the new auspices there was
a brief period of prosperity: six professors were chosen, and the
�30
students increased to one hundred in number. But the old
trouble—the interference of the trustees in the administration of
discipline—reappeared. The election of a number of members of
the Board from one Christian denomination raised a cry of
sectarianism, and the affairs of the College were brought before
a committee of the Legislature for investigation ; a rebellion of
the students completely shattered authority. “We never/’ says
Dr. Neill, “recovered from the effects of this insurrection; one
of the remote effects was that the whole Faculty left the College
and it was closed for several years.”
Wearied with the fruitless struggle Dr. Neill resigned in
1829. His successor, the Rev. Samuel B. How, entered on his
duties in 1830. Once more the lovers of the College rallied to
its support. Says the College historian, Professor Himes:
“ A new course of study was made out and fuller statutes. The
Alumni Association issued an address full of encouragement.
Among the signatures of the committee was that of James
Buchanan. At the Commencement of 1830, the procession
moved to the church escorted by a troop of horse and several
companies of volunteers. The Alumni oration was delivered
by William Price, Esq., of Hagerstown, Maryland, and the
question, ‘Would it be expedient for the United States to
establish a national university?’ was discussed by Benjamin
Patten, Esq., and Hon. John Reed.” But the old organic trou
ble returned to plague all parties. While discussing, in 1832,
changes of the charter the trustees resolved to close the school.
The light went out in darkness.
In tracing this history of alternating hope and disappoint
ment the causes of disaster have plainly appeared. The first
was the interference of the trustees with the faculty in the
details of government. “The trustees,” says Dr. Neill, “had
too many meetings; the subjects of discipline were always dis
posed to make their appeal directly or indirectly to the higher
court; and from their ex parte statements of their case, which
they had opportunity of making in families of trustees resident
in the borough, a sympathy was enlisted in their favor and the
authority of the Faculty was put in jeopardy.” The second cause
�31
was sectarian jealousy. Though predominantly, Dickinson Col
lege was not exclusively Presbyterian. “We had,” says Presi
dent Npill, “suspicions and contests for pre-eminence. The
hue and cry, sectarianism! religious domination! was used as
a handle by which we were dragged before the legislature of
the State, where a tedious and vexatious investigation was had
without convicting anybody of misdemeanor, for there was no
evidence.” The College lacked unity, and lacking unity it
lacked power.
One practicable course remained, and only one, namely, to
pass the College over to other hands, to make it strictly and
wholly the institution of some one Church. It might, it is true,
have become a State university, but the entire charge of any
school of the higher learning is contrary to the settled policy
of Pennsylvania. During these years of struggle, the Metho
dists had grown into a great and prosperous body, and Dickin
son College was offered to them. On March 12th, 1833, the
trustees were summoned to consider a proposal of transfer from
the Baltimore Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal
Church. The Philadelphia Conference was soon after associated
with the Baltimore in the negotiations. “The transfer of this
large interest,” says Professor Himes, “to the control of the
Methodist Church was, in the language of the trustees, a proper
expedient for the effectual and direct promotion of the original
design of the founders of the College. A committee with
plenary powers, after carefully considering the subject in sessions
running through a week, reached an affirmative decision. The
mode of transfer was very deliberately considered in all its legal
J aspects, and finally it was regarded as most desirable that it
should be accomplished by the gradual resignation of the trus
tees then in office, and the election in their stead of those provi
sionally appointed by the conferences?’
On a beautiful July morning in 1834, the writer of this
address left Philadelphia with his parents for Carlisle. A
journey of a day brought the travellers to Columbia, and another \
of more than half the night by stage, to Harrisburg. Setting
out early the next morning, the tedium of the slow progress was
�32
relieved by the charm of the conversation of Chief Justice
Gibson, who, though unknown to us, was as affable as an old
and cherished acquaintance. What a scene of calm repose lay
before the wondering eyes of the city boy! The old College
graceful in its unadorned simplicity, the budding green of the
newly planted trees of the campus, the haze of the blue that
softened the aspect of the mountains on either side, made a
picture which stamped itself forever on the memory. Nor care,
nor grief, nor toil, nor absence can corrode one of its outlines,
or dim a single tint. Surely this was “the Happy Valley” shut
in and consecrated to quiet meditation and blissful thought!
A school had been opened, and under Alexander F. Dobb, a
thorough drill-master of the English style, boys and youth were
making good progress in the classics. Woodward was already
there, and Rhodes, and Waters, and the Lyons, and the elder
Lamberton, and Knox, and Zug, and others whom I cannot now
name. A sweet homelike feeling pervaded the school, for this
was the blossom time of tender hope. The old tree which had
borne the blasts of half a century was putting forth the promise
of a new fruitage. On the 10th of September, the procession
of President, trustees and scholars was formed and we marched
to the plain old church in Methodist Alley, where Dr. Durbin
delivered his inaugural address. How many such processions
had Carlisle seen, how many openings and reopenings whose
bright promise had faded away into the darkness of the night,
and whose broken hopes had saddened devoted hearts? Would
this one, bald in its simplicity, foretoken success or failure ? It
meant success; not because the new organizers were more tena
cious of purpose than the old, but because Dickinson College
had now become one in and with itself. Hereafter it was to
have but one spirit; but one purpose, and that avowed; one
source of sustenance, the Church, of which it was to be the
organ. Poverty was before it, trials were before it, but in all
the poverty and all the trials it was understood that Dickinson
College was to live or to die, as it was sustained or not sustained,
by the Methodist Episcopal Church.
�33
,
The two churches, the giver and the receiver of this valuable
property, were not alien from each other. Presbyterianism and
Methodism had been in some measure linked together, in the
preceding century, through the labors of Whitefield. The great
Oxford evangelist and the Tennents had been of one heart and
purpose; the spirit of religious revival of which the one was
the messenger, had broken into the Presbyterian body, and had
produced the excision of the New Brunswick Presbytery, and
the division of Presbyterians into “the Old Side” and “the New
Side.” It is needless to say that the great development of
education in the Middle States was due to the New Side or
revivalist Presbyterians. “We of the Presbyterian Church,”
says Dr. Archibald Alexander, “are more indebted to the men
of the Log College for our evangelical views and our revivals
of religion than we are aware of. By their exertions, and the
blessing of God on their preaching a new spirit was infused
into the Presbyterian body; and their views and sentiments
respecting experimental religion have prevailed more and more,
until at last opposition to genuine revivals of religion is almost
unknown in our Church.” The grandfather and grandmother
of Dr. Archibald Alexander were awakened under the preaching
of Whitefield. In the year 1743 a great revival in Virginia
among the Presbyterians resulted from the reading of a volume
of Whitefield’s sermons brought over to America by a young
Scotchman. Gilbert Tennent, in Philadelphia, and William
Tennent, Jr., in Freehold, propagated Whitefield’s spirit and
were imitators of his earnest evangelism. Though not recog
nizing the fact, the two churches were kindred, and working
towards the same end,—the spread of the great evangelical revi
val which had its origin in the early years of the eighteenth
century. Under such conditions and under the liberal policy
of-the new government, Presbyterian and Methodist students
sat side by side as brothers on the same class benches, and
to-day our Alma Mater cherishes the memory of Thomas Verner
Moore as tenderly as that of any son who has borne her name
and done her honor in the world.
�34
The new Board of Trustees had wisely determined not to ,
open the College till $40,000 had been raised for endowment.
By May, 1834, pledges to the amount of $48,000 had been
secured. After a suspension of two years and a half the work
of education began again; with twenty students distributed into
two classes, and with seventy scholars in the grammar school;
by the year 1836 the number of students had increased to one
hundred and two, and in 1837 the first class under the Methodist
administration, represented here to-day by our beloved Bishop
Bowman, was graduated.
Come to me ye memories of long past years, and bring before
me again those beloved, those idolized men, the members of our
first Faculty. I see Emory, the picture of manly vigor, walking
up the chapel aisle and taking the oath of office administered
by Judge Reed. Durbin, whose large, lustrous eyes fascinate the
beholder, reads once more, with slow and measured accent, the
morning lesson from the chapel pulpit, and offers the simple
prayer of childlike faith and trust. Caldwell, the Christian
Aristides, tender and just, sits again in his chair, and with slow
and hesitating speech unfolds the intricacies of mathematics or
clears up a dark point in psychology. McClintock, as radiant
as Apollo and as swift, too, as a beam of light, amazes us by the
energy with which he quickens our minds. Allen, massive in
form and solid as his own New England granite, moves among
us to show us how transcendant power can be blended and inter
fused with a sunny temper. But what shall I say of him, the
man of genius of that brotherhood, whose lips had been touched
with celestial fire, orator, administrator, the matchless John P.
Durbin I In the class room his conversation was more brilliant
than the text which he explained. His fertile and suggestive
mind wandered from point to point, and we sat exhilarated as
new vistas of truth, one after the other, opened before us. Or
it is Sabbath morning and he occupies his throne, the pulpit.
The text is “ Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and
given him a name which is above every name;” the theme, the
humiliation and exaltation of Christ. The first propositions are
so simple that they seem to be truisms, the first manner is so
�35
didactic that but for the composure of the speaker* you would
resent the attempt to fix your attention by such methods. State
ments are made so obviously convincing that you wonder you had
never thought of them before. He holds you and you cannot
choose but listen. All the time the enchanter is weaving his
spell about you and preparing for the triumphant assertion of
his power. Suddenly, as suddenly as the lightning’s flash, his
vehemence and passion burst upon you. The torrents of feeling
which he had until now sternly repressed, flow forth with
irresistible force. He has made no mistake; he has calculated to
a nicety his possession of your sympathy, and you are borne
along by him whithersoever he will. His port and bearing have
changed; his manner is that of one fully conscious of mastery
over the hearts of his fellows, and his voice, vibrant with
emotion, searches all the recesses of the soul. You are absorbed,
captured, and when all is over you are aware that for a time
you had wholly lost consciousness of yourself.
It abates nothing from these facts that Dr. Durbin’s power as
an orator declined after he had committed himself wholly to
administrative tasks. In his later years he lived among us less
as an orator and more as a statesman;
“With shoulders, fit to bear
The weight of mightiest monarchies.”
He himself never grieved over the change, and welcomed the
men who increased in public favor while he decreased; for he
was careless of fame, solicitous only to do his appointed work
thoroughly well. It was characteristic of him that he destroyed
most of his private papers and forbade the writing of his life.
The members of our first Faculty taught as much by their
virtues as by their formal lessons. They have gone to their
graves. Allen, the last of the company, whom we had hoped
to have with us to-day, has joined his colleagues in the better
land. Of their successors it does not become me in this place to
speak. In 1848 Caldwell and Emory died; McClintock was
called by the Church to another post, and only Allen remained,
to become a few years later President of Girard College. Their
�36
successors, Peck, Baird, Collins and Johnson, and Tiffany, and
Marshall, and Dashiell, and others whom I will not tarry to
name, not forgetting the present distinguished Faculty, con
ducted the College often in the midst of sore discouragement,
but always with undying faith. They were animated by the
spirit of Rush when he said, in 1783: “Our College, it must,it will prosper.” Since 1834 it has steadily prospered; it has
been loved, not always with a clear vision of its needs, but
still tenderly loved. Through the forbearance of the detachment
of the Confederate army which held Carlisle for several days
during 1863, neither grounds nor buildings were harmed. God
be thanked that when grim-visaged war ruled the hour, this
homage was paid to the mother of us all.
Brothers, my task is done. I have rehearsed, very imper
fectly to be sure, the story of a hundred years. It is a story of
devotion which, despite many vicissitudes, has not failed of its
object; of the cares and prayers, of the labor and pains of a
succession of strong men, given without stint that this College
might live. Our College is hallowed to us by the aspirations
of patriots who were founders of American liberty; by the
fragrant memories of saints who were beloved in two great
churches. What thoughts have in these hundred years been
turned towards it; what anxieties expended upon it! From
their graves, our fathers call to us to cherish this product of
their heart and brain, of their love for our country and their
love for God. How well, too, has this school vindicated their
wisdom, in the long succession of worthy men who have gone
from it to do their duty in the world. Our mother stands
before us to-day clad with the honors of a century. Sweet
mother! though poor, making many rich. As she has lifted
us up, let us in return give her a queenly seat; her true place
is among the highest, the greatest, the proudest of the schools.
Thus, in ennobling her, we ennoble ourselves; and each of us will
feel a deeper joy in saying, “I, too, am a son of Dickinson.”
�
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Dickinson College; the history of a hundred years: alumni oration delivered at the Centennial Commencement of the College, Wednesday, July 27th,1883, at 8 P.M.
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Crooks, George Richard
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Collation: 35 p. ; 23 cm.
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Education
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Conway Tracts
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Text
THE POLICY OF
SECULAR EDUCATION
BY
HALLEY
STEWART
President of the Secular Education League
Secular
Education League,
12 PALMER St. 8- W.L
[reprinted,
by kind permission op the editor, prom the
“ NINETEENTH CENTURY AND APTER,” APRIL, 1911 ]
��63)4?
THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
HE last Education Bill worthy of the name was that which was
introduced by Mr. Balfour and passed into law in 1902.
Whatever its merits and demerits, it was a measure vitally affecting
the organisation of elementary education in England. It did what
the Conservative party had long aimed at. By placing practically
the whole cost of elementary education upon the rates and taxes it
gave the Church of England schools a fresh lease of life. But it did
something more than that: it abolished the old School Boards, and
placed education under the authority of the Urban and District
Councils. This was a change of the first importance, whether for
good or ill as various sections of the religious world regarded it; a
point with which the present article has no special concern. Mr.
Balfour’s Act profoundly affected the educational system of the
country besides providing large additional funds to meet the
necessities of the Church of England schools, which were being outrivalled by the better-equipped Board schools. Nothing of the kind,
however, can be said of the three Educational Bills of the Liberal
Government introduced by Mr. Birrell, Mr. McKenna, and Mr.
Runciman. Those Bills were simply readjustments of ecclesiastical
control over national education. They might be called redistribu
tions of religious privilege amongst the principal Christian Churches.
The stubborn attitude of the Catholic Church had secured all that it
required, and it was allowed virtually to stand outside the general
system of education and enjoy a contract of its own with the State.
Jews, Agnostics, Secularists, and Ethicists were not thought impor
tant (that is, powerful) enough to trouble about. Eor them there
was the Conscience Clause. There remained, broadly speaking, the
two great antagonists, the Established Church and the non
established Churches, which for this purpose counted as one. It
was substantially their battle. The effect of all three Bills would
have been (1) to make it more difficult for the Established Church
to maintain its elementary schools, and (2) to set up a system of
3
T
�4
THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
religious teaching agreeable to the Free Churches in all the Council
schools throughout the land as a civic religion.
This view of the matter is strenuously and even indignantly
denied by the spokesmen of the Free Churches. They are perfectly
satisfied that the Church of England seeks its own advantage and
nothing else in regard to national education, but they treat it as a.
kind of blasphemy to suggest that the Free Churches are tarred
with the same brush. Gladstone saw clearly enough what the plain
issue was in 1870. For his own part he rather favoured secular
education, and in private he was loud in denouncing “ the popular
imposture of undenominational instruction.”
Lord Morley, in
dealing with the whole controversy over the first Education Act,
does not hesitate to say that “ at bottom the battle of the schools
was not religious, but ecclesiastical.” “ Quarrels about education
and catechism and conscience,” he adds, “ masked the standing
jealousy between Church and Chapel.” “ The parent and the
child,” he notes, “ in whose name the struggle raged, stood indif
ferent.”1 They stand indifferent still. The war over religious
teaching in elementary schools is a clerical war. Even when
School Board elections were heated sectarian quarrels, the great
mass of the ratepayers did not go to the poll. They take less,
rather than more, interest in the quarrel nowadays, for the people
are recognising clericalism as the enemy in every civilised country.
The parents and children are never heard of, except by proxy, in
this dispute, which is carried on exclusively by the representatives
of other interests than theirs. Lord Morley’s quick phrase sums
up the whole matter. The quarrel over education is a quarrel
between Church and Chapel. The choice between the policies of
these rivals is the only one presented to the people in a country
where religious congresses never tire of lamenting that four-fifths
of the adult population seldom or never enter church or chapel.
Politicians are slow to learn, but it should be easy for them tosee that the incubus on education all along has been the assump
tion put forward on behalf of the Churches that it is their right,
in the very nature of things, to have special consideration shown tothem. All the controversy and strife has sprung from this cause.
And the mischief will continue until statesmen learn—and are bold
enough to act on their knowledge—that members of Churches,
however powerful and distinguished, should be treated only ascitizens in regard to all political and social questions. The interests.
1 Life of Gladstone, Vol. II., pp. 306, 307.
�THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
5
of their special religious organisations should be nothing to the
State. Fortunately, this view is finding ever wider and wider support
both without and within the Churches. A strenuous effort is being
made to prevent the perpetuation and extension of the odious
injustice which is inflicted by those who secure the propagation of
their own religion in the nation’s schools at the expense of the entire
community. It was for the object of uniting the supporters of this
view in an effective organisation, irrespective of their views on other
matters, that the Secular Education League came into being. The
League neither professes nor entertains any hostility to religion. It
simply regards religion as a personal and private matter, which all
should be free to promote in voluntary associations, but which
should never come under the patronage or control of the State. The
League takes its stand on the principle of citizenship, with freedom
and equality for all in matters that lie beyond. Ministers of religion
sit on the General Council and also on the Executive Committee
with well-known non-Christians. Without the invidiousness of
citing names it may be mentioned that one of the earliest members
of the General Council was the late Mr. George Meredith, and the
first President of the League was Lord Weardale.
The Secular Education League has been boycotted by most of
the newspapers, who have taken sides for Church or Chapel in the
education struggle, and follow the English plan of ignoring, even as
news, what is against their own policy. But no boycott can prevent
the inevitable. The separation of the temporal and spiritual powers
is surely, if slowly, prevailing in every civilised country. It has
dealt with one department of public life after another, and it will
finally settle the question of national education. This has already
happened in France, and we are on the way to it in England. We
are nearer to it, perhaps, than is usually believed. In the article by
the Rev. Professor Inge in the September number of this Review, it
was admitted that “the potential strength of the secularist vote is
far greater than most friends of religious education at all realise.”
“ The danger of complete secularisation,” he said again, “ is far
greater than most religious persons imagine.” The same confession
was made by two other members of the Education Settlement
Committee, writing elsewhere1 in behalf of the programme called
Towards Educational Peace. Dr. M. E. Sadler said that “ strong
forces are pushing English education into secularism.” This was
his opening sentence and the reason of his article. Further on he
Contemporary Review, September, 1909.
�6
THE POLICY OE SECULAR EDUCATION
referred to what might soon be the fate of religious teaching “ if
public opinion once turned decisively towards secular education,”
and added, what to him is evidently the alarming announcement,
that there are many signs that such a change may quickly show
itself.” This statement was even more strongly expressed on a later
page. Dr. Sadler remarked that “ most cool-headed observers who
have travelled in the United States and in the British Colonies
would be inclined to predict that the secular solution is most likely
to be adopted in England as the next step.” “ I am bound to admit
this likelihood,” he said, “ though I deplore it.” The Rev. J. H.
Shakespeare used words very much to the same effect. After
declaring that religious education must and would be preserved ; that
ethics divorced from religion were not only of no value, but posi
tively dangerous; and that the people were dead against secular educa
tion ; to give gravity to his warning of his fellow religionists, and to
justify his own anxiety, he almost involuntarily disclosed the actual
truth.
‘I do not agree with the Gibardian,” he said, “that it
[secular education] is a bogey of which we need not be seriously
alarmed. It has drawn perceptibly nearer. More and more men say
to each other : ‘ We do not wish it or like it, but it is better than this
endless and bitter strife!’”
Not one of these advocates who so dread secular education
definitely assigns any reason against it, but simply expresses his own
preference for religious teaching.
The champions of religious
teaching generally evade the question of principle. They treat
possession as more than nine points of the law. But the question of
principle cannot be evaded in that free-and-easy manner at the bar
of public opinion. The religious educationists will find that they
must give a better reason against secular education than the high
value they themselves set upon their own religion, which, by the
way, they generally assume for the purposes of this controversy is
homogeneous—as if there were no serious differences in doctrine,
and even in ethics, between the various Churches.
What right have they to impose their religious preferences upon
the rest of the community ? On that point the Secular Education
League issues a clear challenge. “ There can be no final solution of
the religious difficulty in national education,” it says in its manifesto,
until the Education Act is amended, so that there shall be no
teaching of religion in State-supported elementary schools in school
hours, or at the public expense.” This is the pivot on which the
whole struggle practically turns.
And the religious educationists
�THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
7
will have to face the free and full discussion of the questions (1) why
the schools maintained by all the citizens should be made the homes
of sectarian teaching ? and (2) why religious teaching of any kind
should be supported at the nation’s expense—that is to say, at the
cost of citizens who are irreconcilably opposed to it as false and
harmful, or who, believing in religious teaching, are unalterably
opposed to its compulsory propagation at the national expense ?
But, although the discussion of principle is evaded by all sections
of religious educationists, they have their own peculiar way of
repelling the claims of secular education. That way is twofold,
negative and positive; the former consists in declaring that secular
education is impossible, the latter in declaring that it is mischievous.
Let us see whether it is either.
Mr. Shakespeare represents the politician as “ well aware that
the great mass of the people are dead against what is known as
secular education.” Dr. Inge, however, is of opinion that “ the
working-class parent is not interested in the religious education
controversy.” One would like to know on what basis Mr. Shake
speare makes his assertion. They have never had an opportunity
of accepting or rejecting the policy of secular education. How does
Mr. Shakespeare know what they would do if they had to decide the
question ? He does not point to a single fact in support of his view.
But a striking fact may be pointed to which is dead against his
theory that the mass of the people are dead against secular education.
“ The mass of the people ” is rather an elastic phrase, but it must
surely include the working classes. Now the organised working
classes, assembled in their annual Trade Union Congress, have
repeatedly declared in favour of secular education, and each time by
an overwhelming majority. The majority vote has only once been
less than a million; the minority has never reached a hundred
thousand. Even at the last Congress, when the Catholic delegates
made a pathetic appeal for fair play, and urged that Trade Unions
had nothing to do with religion, and therefore ought not to pass
resolutions against religious education in elementary schools, the
minority vote was only eighty thousand. And that is probably the
high-water mark of this intensely clerical agitation. For it will
certainly be pointed out at the next Congress that this pathetic
appeal of the Catholics for what they call fair play is founded on a
misconception. That the State should have nothing to do with
religion, precisely as Trade Unionism should have nothing to do
with it, is the very ground on which the Congress votes for the
�8
THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
exclusion of religious teaching from the State schools. Up to the
present, at any rate, the organised working classes are decisively in
favour of secular education; and this fact plays havoc with Mr.
Shakespeare’s bold assertion. He takes his cue from the oppor
tunism of the hour.
Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, Lord Rosebery,
Lord Morley, the late Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, and other
political leaders, frequently expressed their adherence to the principle
of secular education, although they never did anything for it in
Parliament. As there seems to be a general ignorance of this fact,
a few brief quotations may be permitted. Mr. Chamberlain, address
ing the Liberal Unionists at Birmingham in October, 1902, declared
his adherence to the educational policy that he had propounded
there in 1872 :—
I endeavoured to persuade my countrymen that the only logically just
solution of the great difficulty was that the national schools should confine
themselves entirely to secular instruction, and should have nothing whatever
to do with religious teaching. I should be delighted if I thought that this
were acceptable to the majority of the people.
Lord Rosebery, in his speech at the City Liberal Club in October,
1902, said:—
I suppose the ideal—logical and philosophical—-view of education is that
the State should be solely responsible for secular education, and that the
Churches should be responsible for religious education.
Lord Morley, in his speech at Queen’s Hall on the 20th of March,
1905, said:—
In regard to education, years ago he was in favour of secular, compulsory,
and free education.
Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, in his very important speech at the
Alexandra Palace banquet on the 1st of November, 1902, said:—If we had our way, there would be no religious difficulty at all. We should
confine ourselves (I believe nine-tenths of Liberals would confine themselves)
to secular education, and to such moral precepts as would be common to all,
and would not be obnoxious to people who do not come within the range of
Christianity.
It is well known, in spite of the carefully doctored reports in the
newspapers, that favourable references to secular education in the
Liberal speeches at that time were greeted with enthusiastic applause.
The rank and file of the party appeared to be fairly ripe for the
“ secular solution.” But the party leaders determined otherwise.
They had political reasons for placating the Free Churches, and the
result was Mr. Birrell’s Education Bill. The excuse of the Liberal
leaders was that, although secular education was the wise and just
�THE POLICY OE SECULAR EDUCATION
9
policy, the people would not have it. That pretence has done duty
ever since, and consequently we must not be too severe on Mr.
Shakespeare, whose rash statement has no claim to originality.
So much for the negative objection to secular education; the
positive objection is equally false and far more sinister, and on this
side of their controversial policy the clerical educationists are in
perfect agreement. They rarely make definite statements which can
be challenged and confuted; but they assert, more or less in the
language of innuendo, that secular education, wherever it has been
adopted, has proved itself morally mischievous. This is probably
but a form of the ancient clerical assumption that all persons who
differ from the guardians of the orthodox faith are extremely wicked.
An assumption of that kind has to be more delicately worked now
than it was in former times, when differing from the established
form was too dangerous to be popular. Accordingly we find that
Dr. Inge discreetly drops it altogether. Dr. Sadler handles it very
gingerly. He refers to the “secular solution” as having been
adopted in other parts of the English-speaking world “ not with
auspicious results.” Mr. Shakespeare dogmatises on this matter out
of a full heart, but with a sad lack of knowledge. “ We know,” he
says, “ that in other lands where secular education prevails the
results are deplorable.”
What lands? He does not state. He
rather suggests Australia. “ Australian writers,” he says, “ tell us
of populations growing up without any sense of moral responsibility.”
What writers ? Again he does not state. He is apparently under
the impression that secular education obtains throughout the
Australian continent. Secular education does exist in Victoria;
denominational religious instruction exists in New South Wales, and
undenominational religious instruction in Western Australia; yet
Victoria, according to the official statistics, has far less crime than
New South Wales or Western Australia. Secular education exists
also in New Zealand, and what is the result there ? Sir Robert
Stout, Chief Justice of New Zealand, being in England in 1909 and
interviewed by a Daily News representative on the matter of the
charges made against the morals of his people because of the absence
of religious instruction in the schools, indignantly declared that such
charges were “ false, absolutely false.”
General education of a
purely secular character has obtained in New Zealand for thirty-three
years ; it has worked well, and no serious attempt has been made
to undo it. “ Our teachers inculcate order, obedience, respect for
others,” Sir Robert Stout said, “and the best proof of their success
�10
THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
is seen (1) in the diminishing of serious crime, and (2) in the fact
that those trained free from sectarian bias produce only half as many
criminals in proportion to their number as those trained in the
denominational schools.” Sir Robert Stout was unkind enough to
express an unwelcome truth to his interviewer.
“ I see more
practical heathendom in London in one day,” he said, “ than I should
in a New Zealand back block in a year.” So much for the British
Colonies at the Antipodes. Japan and France not being openly
referred to, there is no call to challenge Mr. Shakespeare’s slander on
their behalf. Too much attention, perhaps, has already been paid
to the unsupported assertion of one who sneers at the idea of “a
foundation for morality on rational grounds,” and goes to the length
of saying that ethics divorced from religion are of no value, and
may even be a public danger.” He evidently thinks that there are
many moralities and only one religion. Not so do philosophers
reason. Ruskin taught (in the splendid second chapter of Lectures
on Art) that “there are many religions, but there is only one
morality ”—and that this morality which is natural to all civilised
men, so far from being founded on religion, receives from it “neither
law nor peace, but only hope and felicity.” Moreover, if Mr.
Shakespeare will take the trouble to think it out, he will probably
see that the policy of secular education does not “ divorce ethics
from religion,” but simply separates them in the national schools,
leaving them united in their own sphere—that of the churches,
Sunday-schools, and homes.
The very best things may be
unwelcome when they are out of place, and what can be more out of
place than one man’s religion in a school against the wishes of
another man who is equally compelled to contribute to its main
tenance ?
Having disposed of the two clerical objections to secular educa
tion, we pause to observe two things which the clerical objectorsusually overlook. In the first place, the working-class leaders, who
really value education as the best friend of their order, are anxious
to see the religious quarrel in the schoolroom ended. They know
that it stands in the way of the educational improvement they desire.
It is quite beyond question that the religious quarrel has been a
serious hindrance to the development of national education.
England will never take her proper place in the van of educational
progress until the State leaves religion in the hands of those who
care for it, and organises education on a scientific and civic basis.
The labour leaders see this quite clearly; they are prompted by
�THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
11
interest as well as by principle in their support of secular education.
In the second place, the triumph of secular education is certain,
apart altogether from its justice. No other solution of the religious
difficulty is possible. Ecclesiastical quarrels end when public interest
in them ceases, or when there is only one side left in consequence of
the most powerful sect having destroyed or swallowed its rivals.
Such a conclusion is inconceivable in England. There is no one
Church powerful enough to end this controversy. The rivalry has
continued ever since the Education Act of 1870 ; it has grown more
bitter every year, and the relative strength of the Churches remains
practically unchanged.
It was that rivalry, even more than the
formal vote of the House of Lords, that kilLed Mr. Birrell s Education
Bill; and it was owing to that rivalry that the Bills of Mr. McKenna
and Mr. Runciman were still-born. And as the bitter rivalry shows
no signs of ceasing or even abating, and as the Government has
learnt already, through three futile Education Bills, what this really
means in practice—and the English public have learnt it too it is
hardly probable that any fresh effort will be made by the Govern
ment to carry a Religious Education Bill in the midst of sectarian
contentions, with the certainty of gaining more hatred from those it
displeases than gratitude from those it only half satisfies. Some day
or other—and sooner, as Dr. Inge and Dr. Sadler perceive, rathei
than later—the Government will be driven into introducing a Secular
Education Bill (though probably not under that name) as the only
way out of an intolerable situation.
Hope, however, springs eternal in the human breast. A few
ladies and a number of gentlemen, a majority of them ministers of
religion, and drawn mainly from two sections of the English
Protestant community, have constituted themselves a self-appointed
and non-representative body under the name of The Educational
Settlement Committee,” and have published their proposals in a
shilling pamphlet entitled Towards Educational Peace. They go to
work with great seriousness, but in the light of the three educational
fiascos of the Liberal Government their effort is quite comical.
They propose everything that has already failed, and add a few
reactionary or impossible suggestions of their own. It was this
plan of salvation that the Rev. Professor Inge advocated in his
article in this Review.1
Under this precious plan peace is to be secured by one party
1 Nineteenth Century and After, September, 1910.
�12
THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
lying quietly down with the other party inside. The chief recom
mendation of the Committee is the perpetuation and extension of the
endowment of religious teaching under the Cowper-Temple Clause.
Religion is to be paid for out of public funds, taught by public
servants, and organised by public machinery. Cowper-Templeism,
however, is opposed to the convictions of millions of Englishmen,
who will not submit either to pay for it or to have it forced upon
their children. The effect of this proposal, if adopted, would be to
intensify the present bitterness and strife, especially as the provision
of religious instruction is left in effect in the hands of every local
education authority. The battle would be transferred from the
school to the county and borough council chambers, and civic
administration and reform would suffer in the strife and confusion
that would inevitably arise. A new establishment of religion under
county and municipal control would be created, and the religious
opinions of candidates, rather than their fitness as administrators of
local affairs, would be the point upon which elections would be fought.
The Committee for Educational Peace propose to leave the Jews
and Catholics with their present privileges untouched. They know
what it would cost the Liberal party to attempt to force the
Catholics into a common general plan of religious education, and
they quietly let discretion stand, in this instance, as the better part
of valour. But all the rest of the nation is to be included.
There is to be ‘respect for all forms of conscientious belief,” but
this new development of Cowper-Templeism is to rule the roost. It
is, indeed, to become the official religion of the nation. And the
teaching of it is to become compulsory. At the present time the
school authorities may confine themselves to secular teaching, as
some of the old School Boards actually did, but this option would
be abolished. The only choice given them under the Committee’s
plan is the provision of Cowper-Temple teaching, or the opening of
their doors to the expert teacher from officially approved denomina
tions. Moreover, the Committee would seek to impose upon the
children an injustice, against which Mr. Birrell expressly provided
m allowing those who took advantage of the Conscience Clause to
absent themselves from school during the time of religious teaching.
This right the Committee would deny. They insist that the child
shall either be present at some religious lessons given by an expert
or be placed in an invidious position before his schoolfellows. The
practical effect of this proposal is to nullify the Conscience Clause.
Every injustice under which the teacher at present suffers the
�THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
13
Committee would continue, if not actually increase. Unless he can
satisfy a sectarian committee that he has definite religious convic
tions of the exact colour desired, he is to be denied the right to earn
his living in a large number of State-supported schools. On the
other hand, while a head teacher is to be forbidden to give denomina
tional teaching in which he may possibly believe, he is even
encouraged to give Cowper-Temple teaching, in which he may not
believe. Professor Inge asserts that there are many Agnostics
among otherwise well-qualified elementary teachers.” In both cases
the Committee’s conditions place a premium upon insincerity, which,
to say the least, is an unfortunate outcome of the latest device for
religious teaching. The concession that, on request, a teacher may
be excused from giving religious teaching is futile. No teacher could
make such a request without jeopardising his professional career.
He would be pointed at by the children, ostracised by his colleagues,
and marked by the authorities. He would practically be compelled
either to give religious teaching or sacrifice his career in the profes
sion he had chosen, and for which he had been specially trained.
The Committee treat the parents with as little consideration as
they show to the teachers and the children. To exercise the choice
of school which is, under certain circumstances, given to them would,
in hundreds of villages, endanger their very livelihood.
It would have been very interesting if the Committee had
prepared a specimen syllabus of the religious teaching they propose.
They were wise enough to avoid this pitfail. They know the
advantage of indefiniteness. Consequently they use vague language
about 11 instruction in the Bible and in the principles of the Christian
religion.” Professor Inge puts it as “ instruction in the suitable
parts of the Bible.” Dr. Sadler overlooked that important qualifica
tion. Mr. Shakespeare’s view of the Bible as “ the book of humanity”
—the treasure of the race, the birthright of every English child, the
safeguard and condition of both civil and religious liberty—is entirely
beside the point. Mr. Shakespeare is not a discreet controversialist.
It is not about the children of religious parents who go to church
and Sunday-school that he and his colleagues are troubled, “it is
with the children of the irreligious,” he says, that we are chiefly
concerned.” The object is to snatch them from parental influence
and proselytise them into Cowper-Templeists. But how foolish to
avow it in this incautious manner.
What do the Committee mean by the principles of the Christian
religion ? Have they ever been stated ? Can they ever be stated in
�14
THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
a way to command the endorsement even of the Christian Churches
themselves. What is it but the principles (or dogmas) of the
Christian religion that all the Christian Churches are divided over ?
Is it not a poor compliment to suggest that they are divided over
anything else ?
And while they are thus divided is it not an
impertinence for one section of Christians, or a combination of
sections probably not a half in point of numbers, to pose, not only
before the populace but before the State, as custodians of the only
true religion ? And is it not farcical when everyone knows that they
dare not formulate their conviction of what is a common Christianity
for fear of falling into irretrievable disunion ?
The same criticism applies to the Bible. The religious, ethical,
or literary value of the Book is not the point at issue. However
high the position assigned to it, in its entirety it is not a proper text
book for elementary schools. Children are curious, and ask incon
venient questions. Moreover, when one asks what is the Bible, as
one asked what are the principles of the Christian religion, it is easy
enough to point to the Book, but that is not an answer to the
question. The late Rev. Dr. Parker, in a letter to the Times of
October 11, 1894, advocating secular education, uttered a grave
'warning to his fellow Nonconformists on this matter:—■
The present condition of Biblical criticism brings its own difficulties into
this controversy. We cannot shut our eyes to the fact that there is no Bible
upon which all Christian parties are agreed. One party says that surely the
historical parts of the Bible might be read, to which another party replies
that the historical parts of the Bible are especially to be avoided, because they
are critically incorrect, and in many instances glaringly contradictory. One
party says, “ Read the Bible because of its Divine revelations to the human
soul to which another party replies, “ The one thing that is to be distrusted
is the claim on behalf of the supernatural or the ultra-historical.” Some say
“ Read the life of Jesus and others say that there is no trustworthy life of
Jesus to be obtained. To some the Bible is historical; to others it is ideal.
Which Bible, then, or which view of the Bible, is to be recognised in schools
sustained by the compulsory contributions of all classes of the community ?
Dr. Parker’s warning in the name of Biblical criticism is certainly
not less valid than it was seventeen years ago. He was not
answered at the time, he has not been answered since. The sup
porters of State-propagated religion still speak of “ simple Bible
teaching” as if it were really a simple plan of religious instruction.
Widely different views and valuations of the Bible are now enter
tained by scholars and preachers within the Churches themselves;
and all sorts of religious ideas, from orthodoxy to complete
scepticism, are held by thousands of elementary school teachers.
The Book itself is the subject of fierce controversy even among
�THE POLICY OE SECULAR EDUCATION
J-
I
15
Christians, and its interpretation by the teachers is bound to be as
various as their own religious convictions. Undogmatic teaching of
the Bible is, therefore, an utter impossibility. While school teachers
are human beings affected by the mental, moral, and religious agita
tions of the age in which they live, with the Bible in their hand as
an authoritative text-book they must impart to their scholars the
colour of their own faith. There are not a few ministers of religion
connected with the Secular Education League who recognise that,
in relation to national education, Christianity itself is necessarily
sectarianism. They do not wish it to be dealt out to the children in
State doses, and they revolt at the idea of its being dispensed in that
way at the cost of citizens who may be strongly opposed to it.
They hold that it is a mean thing and derogatory to true religion to
drive children to the public schools and endeavour to make them
Christians by the force of authority. As Christian leaders they want
no more than fair play. They have written two tracts for the
Secular Education League—An Appeal by Churchmen to Churchmen
and An Appeal by Nonconformists to Nonconformists—which are
marked by ability and candour.
Somehow or other, and yet it is not altogether strange, it is to
the non-established Churches that we must always turn at the end
of this discussion. Sir Robert Stout uttered memorable words to
his interviewer when he said : The attitude of your Nonconformists
and Liberals in England amazes me. They seek to disestablish a
Church, and yet seek to maintain the State school as the Children’s
Church.” It is not unnatural that a State Church should endeavour
to carry its religious teaching into the State schools. Professor
Inge hails the Anglican schools as “ little citadels of the Established
Church.” But where is the justice or the consistency of those who
are opposed on principle to all Established Churches who seek to
turn all the Council schools of England into State-established
citadels of their religion ? That is what they are doing. They deny
that it is specific Nonconformist religious teaching that is given in
the Council schools, but they cannot deny that it is the religious
teaching that is acceptable to and supported by the non-established
Churches—which, in the circumstances, is practically the same
thing. The fact is that the bulk of the Free Churches went wrong
in 1870. Leading ministers like Drs. Dale and Guinness Rogers,
and leading laymen like Mr. Henry Richard and Mr. Illingworth,
with a substantial following, tried to keep them in the right path,
and failed.
The essential principle for which they stood was
�16
THE POLICY OF SECULAR EDUCATION
betrayed. Those who cried for “ a Free Church in a Free State”
did not realise that the same principle demanded a Free School in a
Free State. Happily many of them have learned the lesson of forty
years strife ; they see the mistake that was made, and desire to undo
it. Happily, too, they are a growing number. And the return of
the non-established Churches to their foundation principle and their
old traditions would achieve a speedy victory for secular education.
THE SECULAR EDUCATION LEAGUE.
President: HALLEY STEWART, Esq.,
j.p.
SECRETARY: H. SNELL, 19 Buckingham Street, London, W.C.
The SECULAR EDUCATION LEAGUE aims at binding together in one effective
organisation all who favour the “Secular Solution” of the Education problem,
without reference to any other convictions—political, social, or religious—that
they may entertain.
Those who desire to see the religious difficulty in national education settled
in the only just and satisfactory way are invited to join the League. The
minimum subscription is One Shilling.
Copies of this Pamphlet for distribution will be supplied on liberal terms on applica
tion to the Secretary.
PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE SECULAR- EDUCATION LEAGUE,
19 BUCKINGHAM STREET, STRAND, W.C.
�
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The policy of secular education
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“Religious Education.”
A LETTER TO
CARDINAL MANNING.
PART I.
BY
London :
W. STEWART & Co., 41, FARRINGDON St., E.C.
��6 JO 7/
KT555
“Religious Education.”
May it Please Your Eminence,—I have read in the
Newcastle Daily Chronicle the report of your sermon,
delivered at St. Mary’s Cathedral, Newcastle-upon-Tyne,
on Saturday, September 26th, 1885. From your interest
ing biography, venerable age, and exalted position in the
Romish Church, your utterances challenge criticism.
Whether they challenge criticism from any intrinsic con
siderations I leave your readers and mine to decide.
Recognising that you and I respectively stand at the
very antagonising poles of modern tendency and thought,
I will make an effort to come within touch of you, in order
to, as far as possible, realise your position before I assail it.
Your attitude I recognise to be a complete anachronism:
it belongs to the time when Rufus founded a castle on
the banks of the Tyne, not to the generation in which
Stephenson spanned that river with an iron bridge.
Your Eminence lays stress upon the special solicitud(e
heaven took in children, although only the children of
Jews, before the Christian dispensation, and then you
exclaim:—
How much more, then, are yours—your children that are born
again by water and the Holy Ghost, and are made children of God
in a higher sense than the children of Israel—members of Christ,
heirs of the eternal heirship of the Son of God, of the kingdom of
heaven ?
Am I to infer from the hackneyed and half-meaningless
pulpit jargon of this passage that God likes Jew children
well, but Christian children better ? I have been told
by God, on the authority of his own book, that he is
“ no respecter of personsbut you apparently know
better. Has the unchangeable God changed his mind
and given your Eminence the advantage of a private
revelation, prefaced by : “ Don’t mind my old book : I
�4
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. ’
am a much older and wiser God than I was when I wrote
that”? My children, your Eminence, are neither Jewish
nor Christian : perhaps you would be courteous enough
to say how he regards them. If there be a God who,
on account of the faith of its parents, would even com
paratively disfavour (as you allege he does) an innocent
child, I am glad I am only an Agnostic, and cannot,
by searching, find out such a God ; for, were I a Theist,
and could find him out, I should denounce him as a
malignant fiend and curse him to his face. Thrust aside
your theological tantrums for a moment, Cardinal Man
ning, and tell me if you are not ashamed of this mean
little godling you worship, who, before'he determines to
what degree he will love an innocent baby, takes into
consideration whether its parents are Jewish or Christian.
One of the reasons you allege why God loves the
Christian baby more than the Jewish one is, that the
former is “ born again by water and the Holy Ghost.”
Pray be good enough to step down for a moment from
your ranting theological perch to the firm ground of
common sense, and tell me, in the name of all that is
explicable, what this means. “ Born again by water and
the Holy Ghost” ! You know as well as I do that this
expression is as utterly nonsensical as if your Eminence
had said : “ Born again of a paving-stone and of the
fire-shovel.” Your dupes ask you for bread, and you
give them a stone; they ask for an idea, and you give
them words. Your Church conducts much of its service
in Latin, to impose upon the ignorant and keep them
ignorant; and your priesthood take care that their English
is as unintelligible as their Latin, the threadbare and labo
riously nonsensical platitudes of pontifical jargon. The
“fools and blind ” are awed by the presentiment that some
fearfully significant and mysterious meaning underlies
your priestly babblement. “Born again by water”!
Such jargon, instead of exciting reverent piety with those
with whom you have to cope now-a-days, evokes only
the irreverent contempt which asks : Do you refer to
parturition in a punt on the river, or to an accouchement
down in a diving-bell ? And as for your exceedingly
phantasmal Holy Ghost, will you tell me anything he
ever did, except his being mixed up with an affiliation
�“ RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
5
case under remarkably shady circumstances, appearing
once in the guise of a dove or fantail pigeon, and once
again in the shape of “ cloven tongues as of firewhile
appearing as Paysandu tongues, at 9d. a lb., would have
been more to the purpose ? Is this scurrilous blasphemy?
So be it. It is our contemptuous reply to divine thimble
rigging. Give us arguments to deal with, and wre will
deal with them ; but insult our reason with the hackneyed
and vapid platitudes of professional priestcraft, and our
sneer and our sarcasm will give you to understand what
we think of them and you.
Your Eminence assures us that, as regards children—
They have an invisible guardian—an angel ever watching over
them.
Here, your Eminence, you have effectively curbed my
irreverent levity. To talk, as you do, of an “invisible
guardian ” watching over every child is too sinister and
solemn a mockery for flippant refutation. You are
double my age, Lord Cardinal. Have you not seen
children as I have seen them ? Do you speak in igno
rance, or do you speak in truculent and terrible jest ?
Have you seen the child, partially born, have its skull
crushed in in splinters upon its brain by iron forceps,
as the solution of the desperate alternative whether the
life of the mother or that of the child should be saved?
Where was the “invisible guardian’? Have you seen
the child born mutilated and covered with ulcers, fearful
heirloom from the sins and sorrows of its progenitors ?
Where was the “ invisible guardian ” ? Have you seen
the babe, with sunken eyes and ravenous lip, and the
haggard look that babyhood should never know, tug at
the milkless nipples of a-starving mother ? Where is the
“invisible guardian?” Have you seen that haggard
baby dead and shrouded in a newspaper, as I have seen
it, and smuggled surreptitiously into the coffin of an
adult pauper, and buried with him to save expense ?
Where was the “ invisible guardian ” ? That baby was
so buried in its newspaper cerements because its mother,
who followed it to the grave, through want, would not
stoop to prostitution, even to save its life and her own.
Where was the “ invisible guardian ” ? Have you seen,
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RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
as I have seen, the child born in “ holy wedlock,” but with
the prostitution of its mother resorted to in order to save
its life and hers ; and have you seen that babe, as I have
seen it, drain from its mother’s breast the syphilitic virus
till the cartilege of the baby nose and the scalp on the
baby skull rotted away, and the innocent infant was
putrescent before it reached the tomb ? Where was the
“ invisible guardian ” ? Have you seen the prepossessing
female child fed and nurtured by its own parents, to be
sold to the lecher—incipient human flesh exposed on the
shambles of lust, and knocked down to the highest
bidder? Where was the “ invisible guardian ” ?
I could go on with interrogations like these, your
Eminence, mounting step after step in the terrible climax;
for I, who write to you, am a man who have turned from
the study of Greek to study the fearful moods and tenses
of the streets ; and I have left Hebrew that I might
study the square characters of the alleys and the Massorah of the slums. The hand that holds the pen that
now writes to you has lain upon the pulse of the world,
and felt all the irregular throbbings of the heart of
Humanity.
The eye that glances upon the paper
upon which this missive is written has, for God, gazed
through the clouds of the esoteric till it has been com
pelled to look down in Agnosticism, dimmed and blinded,
outside the unopening gates of Mystery. I have seen
falsehood on the throne, and truth on the scaffold; but
I have never traced, and neither have you, the action of
the “invisible guardian.”
In pleading for the support of schools in which the
Romish faith may continue to be inculcated, your
Eminence remarks:—
And, lastly, some of you, perhaps, may remember the schools of
this parish when you make your last will and testament, and your
Lord’s name will be found among the names of your heirs.
Did your Eminence so far master your risible tendencies
as to look sufficiently solemn for your sacred calling when
you uttered these words ? Cicero opines that two augurs
could not meet without laughing in each other’s faces,
in tacit recognition of how they managed to gull the
populace. When you spoke of Catholics executing their
�RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. »
7
wills, and making Jesus Christ one of their heirs, did
you, internally, put your divine thumb to your sacred
nose and extend your holy fingers? You well know
that Jesus Christ—whether that half-mythical character
ever really existed or not—wants none of your filthy lucre.
You use his name as the shears with which to shear the
sheep, that the fleece may come to the priests. This
lending money to the Lord in celestial debentures is a
very old confidence trick and financial swindle, Cardinal
Manning. The swindle has never been a farthing in the
pocket of “ the Lord,” whatever and whoever he may
be ; but it has, for centuries, swelled the coffers of a fat,
lazy, and licentious priesthood. For how many dreary
and black ages the priest of your baleful creed has
attended at the bedside of the dying man and indemni
fied the expiring wretch against the red fire of hell in
consideration of the Church receiving the red sheen of
his gold ! Is the palpable imposition not yet played
out ? How long, O Lord, how long, will the mothers of
our race only bear and suckle fools ?
Your Eminence goes on to say :—
I would fain much rather speak upon the Sermon on the Mount,
or upon the useful history of the gospel we have read to-day, than
upon the matter on which I may say necessity compels us at this
time to think with all the energy of our hearts—I mean the state
and condition of the education of this country, the peril that is
before us, the unconsciousness of that peril; and that peril multi
plied by the fact that men are not roused up or awakened to see
what is certain and inevitable in the future. Let us, then, con
sider this. From the seventh century down to the present the
education of the people of this land was a Christian education.
The Christianity of England was perpetuated by that which made
England in the beginning. At this moment we have come to what
I may call a deviation from that sacred tradition, which, until now,
has sustained the Christianity of the people of this land. Some
men will call it a new departure. It is the language of the day ;
and it is a useful phrase for us for it is a departure—a striking off
from the tradition, the broad highway of the people, of Christian
England. And we are threatened at this time with a system of
education neither Christian nor English, but borrowed from the
vain and shallow theories of the first French Revolution—that is to
say, a State education without definite teaching, and, therefore—I
will say it boldly—Christianity. Down to fifteen years ago the
education of this land was in the hands of the parents of children
and those whom they spontaneously and voluntarily chose. For
the last fifteen years the State has claimed the children as its own,
�RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
and the State has claimed to be the educator of the children born
within its boundaries. These two principles are the principles of
the old Greek philosophy of the Platonic Republic, revived at the
end of the last century, as I have said, by the vainglorious and
superficial minds who wrecked the noble and Christian people of
France. And these two principles are establishing themselves in
the minds of the people of this country.
I quite credit your Eminence when you allege that you
would much rather dilate upon the “ Sermon on the
Mount ” than comment upon the, to you, extremely
painful fact of the education of the children of this
generation passing out of the hands of your Church, and,
indeed, out of the hands of Christianity. The “ Sermon
on the Mount,” with its cruel mockery and fiendish
sarcasm of '‘'■Blessed be ye poor,” is, possibly, the source
from which you have drawn your terrible trope anent the
“ invisible guardian ” which stands in watch and ward
over every child. But be assured, my Lord Cardinal,
that men are “ roused up or awakened to see what is
certain and inevitable in the future.” They see as clearly
as you do that the “ inevitable ” is that your Church is
doomed ; but they anticipate its dissolution and ruin with
equanimity, where they do not contemplate it with satis
faction. You, most reverend father, and your caste, have
lived upon the base craft of the priest and ascended on
the wings of sacerdotalism to the high places of the
earth; but those who do not belong to your craft have
had to maintain you, and they begin to find out that they
have been gulled too long by your wheedling them to
endure a hell upon earth on the promise that they will
have wings and glory in the skies. They are beginning
to discover that they know as much about the wings and
glory as you do, and find that they are so extremely
problematical that they have resolved to make the best
and the happiest of Here and Now, leaving the wings and
the glory to take care of themselves. They have resolved
that their children shall be taught Reading and Writing
and Arithmetic, and, where practicable, the “ Extra
Subjects and they have freely permitted themselves to
be rated for this purpose, and have practically told you
and yours to stand aside with your Gospels and your
“ Sermon on the Mount,” and let them have a little more
bread and intelligence here, and not stultify them any
�“religious education.”
9
longer with your child-bearing Virgin, your crucified
joiner, and your other monstrous, but to you profitable,
“ teachings ” upon which your poor dupes are to depend
for their wings and their glory.
The very France upon which your Eminence lays
such great stress is drifting away with England from
the rusty and obsolete moorings of your Church.
In France the item for education has just been con
sidered in the Budget; and, when Bishop Freppel
objected to secular schools, M. Debost replied that
they were gaining in popularity, having had since
last year 65,000 more attendants, while the scholars in
the Catholic schools have in the same time decreased
by 13,000. The establishment of professorship of the
History of Religions, to be filled with men who count
the Christian religion as but one among many, was also
very naturally objected to by the Bishop, as virtually
teaching a State irreligion. But to all this it was con
sidered sufficient to reply that these posts would be
filled by men like Ernest Havet and Renan, who would
discuss texts, and not dogmas.
What does your Eminence think of men of the type
of Ernest Renan and Ernest Havet? They are not
exactly the kind of persons upon whom your Church has
pronounced panegyrics. Your Almighty God and your
infallible Church are behind you. Strike and spare not.
Scatter the charred dust of the heretics on the wings of
the wind, as you were wont. You w’ould do so without
invocation from me; but your God has become decrepit
and your Church has become imbecile. There are, alas
for you, no lightning at Sinai to vindicate, no Holy
Inquisition at Rome to avenge. We “Infidels” have
emerged from the Stygian gloom. Our eyes have caught
from the far horizon the sunrise of the world’s morning;
and, long before the sun has climbed to the zenith, we
will stand with our heel upon the neck of your God and
your Church, proclaiming that heaven is annihilated and
hell extinguished, that the Demon of the Seven Hills is
dead, and that man, at last, is free.
Renan and Havet! Alas ! poor Cardinal. Your lines
have not fallen in pleasant places. Simeon Styletes,
standing uselessly on the top of his pillar praying, while
�IO
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
worms and vermin were eating holes through his shrunken
flesh into his sapless bones, was the type of manhood
your papist cultus produced. Marie Angelique, praying
forever, except when she stood on her head before the
Lord, and pointed up to his throne with her unwashed
heels ; or when she sucked, in his holy name, rags that
had bandaged and were saturated with the pus from sores,
was the model type of womanhood your Church pro
duced when she alone was the educator, and none
durst say unto her, What doest thou ?
Your Church, when all the power was hers, my Lord
Cardinal, inculcated a coarse, but devout, blasphemy far
beneath the mental and moral status of the School
Board system which you abhor. For instance, in
several churches of France, remarks Russell, in his
“ Modern Europe,” a festival was celebrated in com
memoration of the Virgin Mary’s flight into Egypt. It
was called the “ Feast of the Ass.” A young girl, richly
dressed, with a child in her arms, was placed upon an
ass superbly caparisoned. The ass was led to the altar
in solemn procession. High mass was said with great
pomp. The ass was taught to kneel at proper places ;
a hymn, no less childish than impious, was sung in his
praise; and, when the ceremony was ended, the priest,
instead of the usual words with which he dismissed the
people, brayed three times like an ass ! and the people,
instead of the usual response, brayed three times in
return!
Your Eminence objects to the School Board and to
secular education generally : no wonder, it is so exceed
ingly different from the “ religious education ” which
held sway when all the power was yours, and when Pro
testants and “ Infidels ” were unknown. A “ religious
education ” embraced profound speculations as to
whether Adam, not having a mother, was “created”
with a navel, and as to whether Christ could have taken
any other form but that of man—as, for instance, that of
a woman, of the devil, of an ass, of a cucumber, or of
a flint stone. Then, supposing he had taken the form
of a cucumber, how could he have preached, worked
miracles, or been crucified ? Whether Christ could be
called a man while he was hanging on the cross;
�RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
I1
whether the Pope shared both natures with Christ;
whether God the Father could in any case hate the Son ;
whether the Pope was greater than Peter, and a thousand
other niceties far more subtle than those about
“notions,” “formalities,” “quiddities,” “ ecceities,” “in
stants,” and “essences.” This “religious education,”
whose demise you lament, disposed the mind all through
Christendom to give a ready credence to miracles worked
by bottles of Christ’s blood and bottles of Mary’s milk,
“ God’s coat,” “ our lady’s smock,” part of the last supper,
a piece of the halter with which Judas hanged himself,
a bone of Mary Magdalene, at least two different heads
of Thomas-^.-Becket, Christ’s picture on a handkerchief
which he had sent to Abgarus, Christ’s foreskin, and a
finger of the Holy Ghost. In the genuineness of these and
thousands of other sacred and miracle-working relics all
Europe believed, Cardinal Manning, when your Church
had undisputed power in education; and, in the few re
maining dark dens of ignorance where your power remains
unbroken, your dupes believe in these relics still; but,
except in her dens of ignorance, Europe will tolerate your
“ religious education ” no more forever.
Ichabod ! the glory of your house has departed ;
and it would not be without sympathy that I should
listen to your wail of desolation, your voice as of one
crying in the wilderness ; but I hear in your wail the
clarion-blast which heralds that the New World is
drawn up in battle-line against the Old. I hear in
your voice in the wilderness the clash of steel in the
Armageddon in which Truth shall conquer Error, and
from which the world shall emerge, not looking for its
salvation to your poor Jew upon Calvary, but looking to
the might that slumbers in its own heart and brain for the
working out of its own sanctification and redemption.
Your Eminence states that, “from the seventeenth
century down to the present,” the education of this
country has been a “Christian education.” Yes; but it
is just because Christianity was established in England
so early as the seventh century (it was established much
earlier than that, as your Eminence will see when you
begin to read history) that it should be continued no
longer. What suited the seventh century will not suit
�12
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
the nineteenth. Human progress is as slow as the
proverbial “ mills of Godstill, it is progress ; and
what suited lethargic Saxons or steel-shirted Danes under
Offa or Hardraga will not suit the awakening intelligence
of England in the reign of Victoria.
Could I sympathise with a terrible calamity falling
upon the defenceless head of Abaddon, I should sym
pathise with your Eminence in your cry of tribulation
thatvthe education of the children of our time is passing
—has almost passed—out of the control of the Church.
This, to your Christian Abracadabra, simply means
perdition. It was only because the Christian priesthood
got hold of plastic childhood, and maimed the intellect
and mutilated the understanding, that you got Christianity
to be accepted by any except lunatics. Try it with adults
who never heard of it till they were adults, and from
the experiment you will be able to determine whether
or not what I say is true. I make bold to allege that
there never was a really sane human being in the world
who had reached manhood before he had heard of Chris
tianity, and then adopted it from the appeal it made to
his mental and moral acceptance. You have tried the
adult Jew and the adult Hindoo for ages, and what have
you to show for your missionary zeal and vast monetary
sacrifice? Your labourers have got no souls for their
hire. The field consecrated by their devotion, and not
infrequently watered with their blood, is sterile. The
effort is stupendous, and the result is mV.
No wonder that you cry with a bitter and despairing
cry that the children are taken from you. For centuries
you have crippled and debased them to bring them down
to the low standard of your creed and render them
the half-hewn caryatides to support the superstructure of
your wealth and power and splendour. It is in youth
the Chinese must distort the feet of their ladies into the
pedal abortions upon which Chinese ladies walk. If
they tried to do so in later life, the more consolidated
tarsal and metatarsal bones would resist, and the woman
would perish before the deformity was effected. It is
only in early youth you can bend the credence into accept
ing as fact that Jonah was three days “ in the whale’s
belly,” and that the Son of Man was three days “in
�“religious
education.”
13.
the heart of the earth;” and that, at the end of three days,
Jonah got vomited out on dryland ; and that, at the end
of three days, the Son of Man got up out of his grave
and flew to heaven. Tell this to any man out of Colney
Hatch, and see whether he will believe you. Then, is
it moral to impose to such an extent upon the innocent
credulity of a child as to impress fables upon him as
facts, and burn them so deeply into his soul with the
accursed branding-irons of your priestcraft that the
intellect of his manhood is unable to deface the scars ?
You can rely upon the judgment finding for Christianity
only when that judgment is strongly warped by early
prejudice. Without the instilling of that early prejudice
you cannot make Christians, and you never will. You
use with skill all the most powerful influences of mental
distortion : you use shuddering fear ; you use the most
exalted love. You terrify the child with the fire and
brimstone of your hell, and you decoy him with the
tenderest emotions to which the human heart ever
throbbed; for the child first lisps his prayer at his
mother’s knee, and, in after years, the words have still
memories of a mother’s kiss and the halo of a vanished
face and the echo of a voice that is no more. The first
dread of hell, the first memories of a mother’s love, are
skilfully linked on to a debased and degrading supersti
tion, and they are, alas! too often strong enough to
support that superstition through a whole life. And this
deep engraining of prejudice, in favour of monstrosities
which, but for this prejudice, wrould never, on their own
merits, have had a moment’s serious consideration, is
what you and your clerical fraternity of all denomina
tions call Education ! Education, forsooth—it is the
very antithesis of it. You know that the intellect, if left
unmutilated till it matured, -would attach at most as
much credence to the Arthurian as to the Gospel legends.
Accordingly, to make sure that the intellect shall never
see above and beyond the “ truths ” which must be
believed in the interests of priestcraft, you take the
intellect in its infancy and burn out its eyes, or at least
afflict them with myopia and a malignant squint.
And this is Education ! For shame, my Lord Cardinal 1
If your Christianity be so true and reasonable, wait till
�14
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
the reason is developed before you attempt to teach.
I will then make you welcome to the half-dozen idiots in
all England who will believe your fable. But, in the
name of all that is sacred in the soul of the race, desist
from mutilating the intellect and debasing the morals
of little children in the interests of your irrational and
execrable creed. They are guilty who mutilate the feet
of Chinese girls, that when they become women they
may not wantonly walk into their neighbour’s houses;
but thrice damned is the guilt of those who mutilate the
intellects of European boys and girls, that when they
become men and women they may “ walk in the way of
the Lord.”
The section of the Christian Church of which your
Eminence is an ornament has always presumed upon the
crass ignorance of its votaries, and done its best to keep
that ignorance devotedly dense. But surely you presume
too much upon the ignorance of even the dupes of the
Church of Rome when you slanderously refer to “ the
vainglorious and superficial minds who wrecked the
noble and Christian people of France.” Surely some,
even in your ignorant auditory, must have had a surmise
that the “vainglorious and superficial minds” you referred
to were the Economists and the Encyclopaedists. Your
disparaging sneer was flung at Voltaire, D’Alembert,
Diderot, Duclos, Mably Condillac, Rousseau, Turgot,
Marmontel, Helvetius, and Raynal. Was there not,
even in the dull brains of the bigots who listened to you
at Newcastle as you sneered at “ superficial minds,” some
unbidden vision of a living pigmy kicking at a phalanx
of dead colossus ?
And, as for “the noble and Christian people of France,”
where did they exist outside of the prejudiced imagina
tion of your Eminence ? As for the people of France
before the Revolution you deplore, “ Christian ” they
may have been ; but “ noble ” they were not. The world
has never seen—and may the world never see again—a
people so utterly trampled down into the abyss of want
and misery and general degradation. Every schoolboy
knows this ; but your Eminence, apparently, does not
know it—or, rather, does not want to know it. “ Every
thing was fastened on by a few hands; everywhere the
�“ RELIGIOUS EDUCATION/’
J5
smaller number was in set opposition to the plundered
many. The nobility and clergy possessed nearly twothirds of the landed property ; the other third, possessed
by the people, paid taxes to the crown, a multitude of
feudal dues to the nobility, tithes to the clergy, and was,
moreover, subjected to the devastations of noble sports
men and the depredations of their game. The taxes
upon commodities weighed upon the great mass, and,
consequently, heaviest upon the people. The mode of
levying them was vexatious; the gentry might be in
letters with impunity; the people, on the contrary, were
ill-treated and imprisoned in default of payment. It
maintained by the sweat of its brow and defended with
its blood the higher classes, while scarcely able to subsist
itself. The inhabitants of towns, industrious, enlightened
—less miserable, certainly, than the peasantry, but en
riching the country by their industry and reflecting credit
upon it by their talents—enjoyed none of the advantages
io which they were entitled. Justice, administered in
some provinces by the gentry, in the royal jurisdictions
by magistrates who had bought their offices, was slow,
often partial, always ruinous, and especially atrocious in
criminal cases. Personal liberty was violated by lettres
de cachet, the liberty of the Press by royal censors.
Lastly, the State, ill-defended abroad, betrayed by the
mistresses of Louis XV., compromised by the ministers
of Louis XVI., had just been dishonoured in the eyes
of Europe by the shameful sacrifice of Holland and
Poland.”* So much for “the noble and Christian people
of France,” and the glorious state of affairs that the
“ superficial minds ” overthrew !
It is with diffidence I remind your Eminence of what
a “ noble and Christian people” the French were before
the “superficial minds” wrecked their nobility and
Christianity. To pay the infamous gabelle, a tax on
salt of about sevenpence in the pound, and other grievous
taxes, “ I have known poor people,” says Michelet, “sell
their beds and lie upon straw ; sell their pots, kettles,
and all their necessary household goods, to content the
unmerciful collectors of the king’s taxes.” There is a
* Thiers’ “ History of the French Revolution,” vol i., p. 9.
�“religious
16
education.”
well-known official document extant which proves that
the people were oppressed to such a degree that they,
“ could not buy wheat or barley ; they had to live on
oats, to nourish themselves on grass, and even to die of
hunger.” “ The people have not money to buy bread ;”
and Foulon, the model tax-collector, retorted : '"'■Then kt
them eat grass ”—this “ noble and Christian people of
France,” whose exalted position the “ superficial minds ”
so wickedly overthrew! No doubt your Eminence
admires the corvee with the admiration you lavish upon
the vingtieme and the gabelle. By virtue of this corvee,
on certain days in each year, the officers of the Court
went through the country, seized the peasants at will,
and marched them off in droves to make or repair the
public roads. For this the peasants received no pay;
and, if they could not, during their short respites from
labour, beg enough to keep themselves alive, they might
perish of hunger. Your Comte de Charolois amused
himself by going about with his musket in his hand,
looking out for peasants thatching their cottages, that
he might fire at and shoot them for the sport of seeing
them roll off the roof to the ground. How deplorable
it is to be sure that the “ superficial minds ” should
object to such a happy condition of affairs among “ the
noble and Christian people of France !”
Every Thzirsday.
THE
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Text
“Religious Education.”
A LETTER TO
CARDINAL MANNING.
PART II.
BY
London :
W. STEWART & Co., 41, FARRINGDON St., E.C.
�.......
¿ 1i
�B3 0 7y
“Religious Education.”
And, Cardinal Manning, you will be gratified to hear
that your Church played an exceedingly prominent part
in the state of affairs the abolition of which you lament»
Great numbers of “ the noble and Christian people of
France ” were Huguenots. We will say nothing of how
your Church waded through the blood of 70,000 of these
Huguenots on a certain eve of St. Bartholomew. But
here is a record in regard to how your Christian Catholics
loved the Christian Huguenots : “ Some they stripped
naked, and, after they had offered them a thousand
indignities, they stuck them with pins from head to foot;
they cut them with pen-knives, tore them by the noses
with red-hot pincers, and dragged them about the rooms.
........... They tied fathers and husbands to the bed-posts,
and ravished their wives and daughters before their
eyes.”* No doubt, since your Eminence considers these
the amenities of a “ noble and Christian people,” you are
justified in your opposition to the un-Christian character
of School Board education. It will certainly not pro
duce the state of things you seem to admire. No set of
men brought up at a Board school will ever see any
motive to use red-hot pincers upon the flesh of those
trained at any other Board school. The teaching of
secular subjects produces no such result. To produce
adult actors in the red-hot pincers tragedy, you must train
children m the horrid dogmas and ruthless intolerance of
your Church. All the murder and martyrdom has been
over your Catechisms. I have never heard that an inch
of human flesh has been scorched, or that a drop of
human blood has been shed, over the Rule-of-Three.
Quicks “Synodicon,” vol. i., pp. 130-131.
�4
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
If you want all the old stabbing and scorching and
persecution and hatred to go on as they were wont, you
will, in early childhood, have to lay the substratum on
which they are based. The School Board will engender
only Philadelphia and cosmopolitanism; therefore, you
do well to attempt to arrest its hand, if you desire a con
tinuance of theological sectarianism and rancour. Get
hold of the children, if you can, my Lord Cardinal;
for it will take very early and unfair initiation to induce
them to tolerate, much less adore, your creed and
you. I repeat, Get hold of them early, if you can ; for
remember the truism Dryden renders so epigrammatically
in his “ The Hind and the Panther —
‘ ‘ By education most have been misled ;
So they believe because they so were bred.
The priest continues what the nurse began,
And thus the child imposes on the man.”
The Due de Chartres built himself a magnificent
brothel, to which from 150 to 200 fallen women were
led each night blindfolded. A gorgeous supper, com
prising the most generous and heating wines, was what
met the eyes of the wantons when the bandages were
removed therefrom. The 150 or 200 women sat down
to the feast in a state of perfect nudity, and had. the
fiery vintages poured out to them by the assembled
*
libertines.
Modesty cries to Mercy to let the curtain
drop upon this carnival of lust participated in by “ the
noble and Christian people of France,” before the
“ superficial minds ” incited the populace to wash away
the stains of Christian lechery in the blood of a godless
revolution. Madame de Pompadour founded that “ noble
and Christian ” institution, the Parc aux Cerfs, and to
this institution were decoyed pretty maidens, no matter
how young, to minister to the pampered sensualities of
the king when Pompadour herself, in the course of years,
had lost her fascinations as a courtesan. A secret police
was instituted to entice, or kidnap, these young girls for
sensual orgies in the Parc aux Cerfs. The pious
Christian king insisted that these girl-children should tell
their beads and say their prayers, anxious that he should
* Vide “ Regede Louis XVI.;” “ Soulaire,” vol. ii., pp. 103, 104,
�RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.'
5
have their bodies and that Christ should have their souls.
Christ generously responded to this solicitude. One of
the little kidnapped ministers of the king’s licentiousness,
a girl of fourteen, had contracted small-pox. From the
girl, in whom it was as yet undeveloped, the king caught
the disease. The malady was fire to tinder in the
corrupt and poisonous blood of the royal débauchée.
His body was one mass of nauseating putrescence. The
stench from the dying lecher was so intense that no one
could go near the bed upon which he festered and died.
Before the writings of the “ superficial minds ” had had
time to take effect, your God, Cardinal Manning, took
this “ noble and Christian ” king unto himself, because
that, when debauching the bodies of little girls, he was
so solicitous that Christ should have their souls !
In 1777 the surface of their “noble and Christian”
France was crawled over by 1,200,000 diseased beggars,
all hungry, all in rags, all criminal and murderous, all
suffering from hideous diseases which want and filth had
brought on, but all “ noble and Christian.” For mercy’s
sake, your Eminence, do, when you are moved by the
Lord Jesus Christ to speak, insist that he move you to
speak a little nearer the truth ! Remember you are not
speaking amid the darkness of the seventh century, to
which you refer so fondly. Remember that I, an ir
reconcilable layman, conduct a journal which shrinks
not from the duty of speaking plainly to you, Cardinal
though you be. The only arguments you ever had to
meet such objections as I raise, such criticisms as I offer,
were of the dungeon-and-fire order ; and neither of these
you can now employ against me. The storm of public
opinion has' blown the roof off your dungeon, and Freethought stands defying you with her foot placed upon
the torch that lit your martyr-fires. Do, then, keep a
little nearer the truth ; for, if you do not, I promise you
I will strike and spare not ; and although the clientele I
appeal to may not, in your opinion, be “ noble,” and is
certainly not “ Christian,” it is neither small nor power
less ; and it prefers my history to your faith, my blasphemy
to your mass, and my sarcasm to your prayers. This
clientele can, if you persist in putting forward devout
fallacies, afford to dispise your Eminence ; but your
�6
“ RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.’
Eminence cannot afford to despise it; for, unlike you,
it raises no wail that its house is falling into decay : it
faces you, young indeed, but strong and resolute ; and,
panoplied in the armour of truth and righteousness, it
means to go forward conquering and to conquer, till
“ noble” does mean noble, and till the term “ Christian”
is first execrated and then abandoned.
Let the tree of Roman Catholic education be judged
by its fruits. Those ignorant and down-trodden thralls
of “ noble and Christian France ” are a specimen of
the fruits. Do you object: “ These are the fruits of
the laic branches of the tree”? Very well, your
*
Eminence, I am willing to stand by testing the fruit on
the cleric branches of the tree—by the very Pope
on the chair of St. Peter. Pope Sergius III., the vice
gerent of God upon earth, lived in concubinage with a
woman named Marocia. Pope John X. lived in con
cubinage with Theodora, a younger sister of Marocia.
Pope John XII. converted the papal palace into a perfect
seraglio, and lost his life by the hand of a husband whose
wife he had dishonoured. Pope John XVII. pursued
the same licentious course, and also perished under the
hand of an avenging husband. Benedict IX. led such
a scandalous life that he outraged even the too tolerant
laxity of the Roman citizens, and was expelled the city.
Clement V. lived in concubinage with his own relative,
the Countess of Perigord. Paul III. was a Sodomite.
Pope Sixtus IV., the founder of the Inquisition, and who
is reported to have died of venereal disease, opened
brothels in Rome, which produced an annual income of
20,000 ducats, which went to help to support the luxurious
lechery of your most holy Christian Church. It was the
same Pope who, in reply to the petition of Cardinals
Robere, Riario, and San Lucas, requesting that Sodomy
might be permitted in Rome during the warm months of
June, July, and August, wrote on the margin of the
petition, “ Let it be so.” And as to Alexander VI., the
Borgia, what thinks your Eminence of him as a specimen
of the fruit of your Christian teaching? He lived in
concubinage with a young girl called Catalina Vanoci: by
her he had several sons and one daughter, the infamous
Lucretia. Lucretia became the concubine of her own
�RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
7
father, the Pope of Rome and vicegerent of God, and
cohabited with her own brothers, Luigi and Caesar.
This holy father-in-God—and father and more of
Lucretia—died of poison which he had himself prepared
for three Cardinals, and which he took in mistake. We
learn from Burnet’s exposition that indulgence in un
natural lusts was so prevalent among ecclesiastics that
St. Bernard, in a sermon preached to the clergy of
“ noble and Christian France,” affirmed Sodomy to be so
common in his time that bishops Sodomised with other
bishops! What think ye of this, your Eminence? Have
I shown you sufficient specimens of the fruit of your
Roman Catholic education? If I have not, say so, and
I will show you more. Give us, who believe in secular
education, a fair chance; give our system some fifteen
centuries, as yours has had, and see whether we will not
produce better fruit. One thing is certain : we can
hardly produce worse.
Your “religious education,” my Lord Cardinal, but
for influences which were non-Christian—nay, antiChristian—would have blotted out forever all the
learning that the past centuries of the world had accu
mulated. While your Church was piously and labo
riously discussing such problems as Was Adam’s faeces
before the Fall malodorous? How many angels at a
time can stand on the point of a needle ? the learning
which dead Greece had left, the learning which mighty
Rome had bequeathed to the world as she herself
crashed and crumbled into ruin, was trodden under the
brute hoofs of your Christian Church, but taken up and
cherished as a priceless boon by the followers of the
Prophet of Islam, whom your Church despised and
hated. “ All the knowledge of mathematics, astronomy,
medicine, and philosophy, propagated in Europe from
the tenth century onward, was derived principally from
the schools and books of the Arabians in Italy and
Spain.”* “ Mere human learning,” as your Christianity
contemptuously called it, owed its salvation from extinc
tion to the persecuted and detested Saracen.
No, your Eminence; learning never did flourish
Mosheim, vol. ii., p. 194.
�RELIGIOUS EDUCATION/
under Christian auspices ; and she only dares to par
tially assert herself now because Christianity is rent and
shattered and half-dead, and where she could once bury
the Albigensian heresy under a million of bloody corpses
she is now impotent to break and silence a bitter pen
like mine. Learning was never at all in the line of the
followers of your uneducated carpenter and his illiterate
fishermen. Your creed, my Lord Cardinal, was hatched
in the nest of Ignorance, and only on the dunghill of
Ignorance can it thrive. Learning, I repeat, was never
in the Christian line; but, to cheer and encourage your
Eminence, I will tell you what was in the Christian line.
From accounts of the Council of Pavia we find that
horses and hawks and gambling and harlots and drunken
ness were very much in the Christian line, and very con
spicuously distinguished the Christian priesthood. And
as for the sanctity of woman, your Church conserved it
as such a sacred trust that the same Council remarks
of your religious houses : “ They seem to be rather
brothels than monasteries.” From accounts of the
Council of Mayence—and, remember, the accounts
of these Councils were not written by wicked Infidels,
but by devout Catholics—it is candidly remarked
that “some priests, cohabiting with their own sisters,
have had children by them.” How to make convents
into brothels, and how to have children by their own
sisters, was the kind of learning your priesthood culti
vated when they were not deep in absorbing studies as to
the exact odour of prelapsarian excrementum, whether
Adam, having had no mother, had a navel, and the
precise number of angels that could stand on the point
of a needle.
One other branch of “ religious education ” was parti
cularly in the Christian line; and, in this branch, the
Christians left the Saracens and all other pagans far
behind. This branch of a “ religious education ” in
which your Church so greatly excelled was Hatred. The
Christians could hate each other more bitterly, and per
secute each other more cruelly, than any other religionists '
on the face of the earth, and their ancient excellence in
this department of polite learning is not yet entirely lost.
It was, as you are no doubt aware, the common proverb
�“ RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.”
9
of the pagans, “ No wild beasts are so hostile to men as
are Christian sects to one another.” No one save rival
Christians ever drenched the fields of the earth with
blood over a diphthong, or ever flew at each other’s
*
throats over such hair-breadth twaddle as the difference
between Filioque and no Filioqne, till the Christian
Church was permanently rent into two sections, the
Latin and the Greek. We have seen the results of
“ religious education ” when your Church had the power.
These things were done in the green tree ; we shall take
care they are not done in the dry.
Is your Eminence aware that in 1861 (before the
institution of the School Board which you deplore), of
persons sent to prison, 8^ per cent, were under 16
years of age. In 1870 7 per cent, were under 16. In
1884 only 3 per cent., and this 3 per cent, has been found
to consist almost entirely of children who have managed
to elude attendance at school. So much for the abhorred
School Board and the diminution of criminality; but,
then, criminality and devotion to your Church go
together; and thus it is that you practically lament that
crime is on the decline. Statistics show with inexorable
clearness that, out of all proportion to their numerical
efficiency outside, the inmates of our prisons are Roman
Catholics. With Superstition and Ignorance you always
must have Crime; but, then, without Superstition and
Ignorance you cannot have Christianity, and, of course,
from a priest’s point of view, better have Crime with
Catholicism than throw over Catholicism to get rid of
Crime.
Before the Education Act of 1870, which is so detest
able to your Eminence, the so-called National Schools
were, as a judicious writer remarks, only sq in name, and
they were administered by one religious denomination,
being therefore under the control of its sectarian influence,
while also supplying instruction to a comparatively small
number of children. The remainder were to be found
in the Dame Schools, British and Ragged Schools, and
the Voluntary Schools of various denominations. But
* I refer to the dispute between the Homoousians and Homoibusians.
�TO
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.'
what of the larger residue ? They were running about
the streets; they were ignorant and uncared for, except
at the hands of noble philanthropists, like the late Lord
Shaftesbury and his colleagues. Imbibing the instincts
of idleness and crime, without a counteracting check,
they sapped the healthy life of the growing generation.
Crime among the juvenile classes had grown to such an
extent that in 1870 no less than 9,998 children were
committed to prison for a variety of offences. Over all
educational facilities for their improvement the State
possessed no control, excepting where schools were
subject to Government inspection as the condition of
receiving grants of public money.
And, in the incontrovertible words of another writer,
“ the Board Schools have through good and evil report
sown the seeds of a new era. The children who go back
to the slums from the Board Schools are themselves
quietly accomplishing more than Acts of Parliament,
missions, and philanthropic crusades can ever hope to
do. Already the young race of mothers, the girls who
had the benefit for a year or two of the Education Act,
are tidy in their persons, clean in their homes, and decent
in their language. Let the reader who wishes to judge
for himself of the physical and moral results which educa
tion has already accomplished go to any Board School
recruited from the ‘ slum ’ districts, and note the differ
ence in the older and younger children ; or attend a
Board meeting, where the mothers come to plead
excuses for their little ones’ non-attendance, and mark
the difference between the old and young mothers,
between those who, before they took ‘mates’ or husbands,
had a year or two of school training, and those who had
given birth to children in the old days of widespread
ignorance.” But all this indisputable improvement of
the social, moral, and intellectual condition of the masses
is, of course, to your Eminence, only a cold and comfort
less fact, seeing that your theological absurdities are being
neglected, and stubborn knees are being trained that will
not genuflect to crosses and relics ; manly voices being
trained, but not to whine your litanies; and above all,
breeches pockets being plenished which will not disgorge
their contents for penance and purgatorial fees for vest-
�“ RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.”
11
merits and images and candle-sticks .and altars and
painted glAss and mummery.
My Lord Cardinal, it is a simulation and a mockery
for you to speak about education at all. As a Cardinal
of the Romish Church, your comments upon education
are about as valuable as would be those of Satan upon
holy water. It has ever been your aim and policy to
murder education; he who murders any person is the
last one in the world whose sincerity we should trust in,
should he evince a specially anxious affection for the
person he had murdered.
I am sorry that the limits of this letter preclude
my giving more than the very vaguest outline of the
learning (?) of your Christian priesthood and the attitude
they have from first to last taken up as regards education.
However the exigencies of the time may urge upon you
to enunciate your theory to-day, we well know what your
attitude has been through all the centuries of your domi
nation. You have ever maintained that the wisdom of
man (and, in the name of casuistry, what other wisdom is
there ?) is foolishness in the sight of God. The unalter
able attitude of your faith towards education, about
which you now orate, may be summed up in the wellknown retort of the infallible Pope, Felix V. A cardinal
one day ventured to reproach him for his ignorance,
whereupon, with pious bigotry, the pontiff replied : “ The
Holy Ghost is not an ass, is it? Well, it will inspire me.
That is its business.” You educated, and (because you
change not unless when you cannot possibly help it) you
would still educate Christendom on the old-fashioned
lines of the Holy Ghost. Now, this Holy Ghost may be
very well as “ the comforter ” to devout imbeciles who
feel the peristaltic movements of the abdominal viscera,
and mistake them for the action of the Holy Spirit. Rut
this Holy Ghost, “the comforter,” is no schoolmaster,
and this I say to his face ; and if he, she, or it have no
face, then I say it to its os coccyx, or whatever part of
it it is decorous to address.
Your infallible Felix V. sounded the keynote of the
devilward march of your hierarchy when, instead of to
study, he gave himself up to gluttony and volup
tuousness, and where anything like education was
�12
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
wanted left the matter in the hands, or feet, or
tentacula, or some such organs, of the Holy Ghost.
And this said Holy Ghost has shirked its business
deplorably. It has been as successful in standing to man
in the place of education as the other third part of a
juggle of a deity has been in redeeming the world. The
party that permits me to speak in its name, your
Eminence, has had enough of the Holy Ghost as a
schoolmaster. We mean to dismiss this ghost, and try
some mortal with a degree from an university, or a certi
ficate from a training college. Besides being a school
master, this ghost of yours has figured as a dove, or
pigeon. The world will figure better when it sees this
pigeon finally baked into a pie and its feet sticking up
through the crust. Is this offensive ? It is not our time
to apologise; it is yours. You first insult our sense and
outrage our reason with your divine twaddle and pious
balderdash, and then expect us to be deferential and
apologetic. Your absurdity and cant is as revolting to
the Agnostic as the Agnostic’s anti-Christian blasphemy
can be to you. Cease to print your inane and insane
lunacies, and, of course, we will cease to attack them.
But, in the interests of the sanity of our race, in the
interests of man’s practicable hopes and rational aspira
tions, insult us no more with the pious legerdemain and
divine conjuring tricks of your pulpits; or, with the
most savage cat-o’-nine tails that sarcasm can wield, we
will lash your rhinoceros hide, O Church, till you will be
glad to find even in the depths of hell a refuge from our
scourge.
You have heard of the lex talionis, your Eminence.
Feel it. We are not your friends. We are your enemies
to the death. We refuse in the interests of conventional
amity to forget your faith’s diabolical record of over a
thousand years. Rivers of the best blood of Europehave, O Church, been let loose by your sword. They
have flowed into a sea of vengeance over which now
gather the thunder-clouds that will burst and shatter
you. These rivers of human blood flow between us and
you ; and over them we refuse to reach you any olive
branch. The charred bones of Giordano Bruno lie
between us and you. The flame that shrivelled up his
�RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
z3
majestic brain and heroic heart yet throws its heat upon
our “ Infidel ” cheek, and over these bones—holier than
tons of your priestly relics—we swear, by our deathless
and relentless hatred of wrong and tyranny, that with
you we will hold neither truce nor parley, that our helmet
shall never leave our head, that day or night our swordbelt shall never be ungirded till your utter destruction is
accomplished and guarantee thereby given that you, O
Rome, will curse the world no more.
“ Christian education ” indeed, your Eminence !
Unless you presumed upon the impenetrable ignorance
of your dupes, you would never dare to refer to such a
sinister sham and flagitious hypocrisy. I say it delibe
rately, judicially, and ' perfectly prepared to take up the
gauntlet of any historical student who may challenge
me : Christian education has been the curse of Europe.
From the very first, Christianity “ despised all knowledge
that was not useful to salvation.”* A great majority
of Christians were anxious “ to banish all reason and
philosophy out of the confines of the Church.”f Up to
the time when Constantine, the libertine and murderer,
took Christianity by the hand, and she found she was in
a position to argue with the sword and debate with the
heading-axe, she took no further pains to discipline
herself in what she contemptuously called mere human
learning. Formerly a section of the Christian priesthood
had taken some interest in such learning, in order to be
able to argue with the Pagan; but the Christian was able
now to argue with the Pagan in a far different fashion—
with the dungeon and the stake, and accordingly “ the
liberal arts and sciences and polite literature fell into a
declining condition.’’^ This Christian bigotry and
murderous persecution asserted itself till, in the words
of Moshiem,§ “ learning was almost extinct; only a
faint shadow of it remained.” Philosophy was persistently neglected, for, writes Moshiem, “ nearly all
supposed that religious persons could do very well without
it, or, rather, ought never to meddle with it.”
I could go on interminably, your Eminence, in demon
* “ Decline and Fall,” chap. xv.
J “Jorian,” vol. ii., p. 212.
+ “ Mosheim,” vol. i., p. 148.
§ Vol. i., p. 359.
�14
“religious education.”
strating that your Church not only utterly neglected
“worldly learning,” but that it assumed to it an attitude
of actual hostility; but I presume that even you, with
your faculty for pious romancing will not pretend there is
any way of rebutting the charge in this respect; so, turn
ing from your neglect of and hostility to “ mere human
learning,” I shall briefly revert to the “ religious educa
tion ” which you have inculcated for fifteen centuries,
and which you teach to-day. You want the education of
the children of this our England to be in your hands.
You teach that these children must be baptised, or that
they will be damned. So urgently do you contend for
this barbarous hocus-pocus of baptism that, if the mother
be likely to die while she is in a state of pregnancy, she
must be cut up alive so that the foetus may be extracted
alive and baptised to obviate its spending an eternity in
fire and brimstone. The sweetness and delicacy of this
doctrine is as conspicuous as its loving kindness of
the fiery sort that demonstrates itself in never-dying
worms and inextinguishable flames. This, your Eminence,
teaches us the incalculable importance of a few drops of
water at the right time, and the ineffective impotence of
the whole Pacific at, say, five seconds subsequent to the
right time. It also teaches us how profound are the
divine mysteries of a “ religious education.”
One beauty of belonging to your Church, your
Eminence, is exceedingly solacing and comforting, and
that is, that you and your fellow Catholics will be saved,
and that all the rest of the world will be damned; for I
find, from your “ Ordo Administrandi Sacramenti,” that
outside “ the true Catholic Faith ” “ no one can be
saved.” Of course, this is quite certain. It is also very
modest; there is not a vestige of blasphemous cheek
about it. The whole world has been “ created ” for the
purpose of being roasted for ever and ever, to afford
amusement to the handful of Catholics who will sit up
aloft in heaven looking down upon the agony wriggle of
the infernal pit. The inhabitants of the globe have
been estimated at 1,000,000,000, and the Catholics amount
to only 160,000,000. Heaven will be the dress-circle,
and Hell will be the stage ; and those on the stage,
amusing those in the dress-circle, dancing an agony break-
�‘religious education.’
15
down, and footing the fiery jig of the damned, will be out
of all proportion to the mere handful of privileged Papists,
wearing crowns, waving wings, thumbing harps, and
looking on. This doctrine is as humble as it is humane,
and gives us a divine insight into the glories of a “ re
ligious education.” It must be so gratifying to a true
Catholic to see his Protestant wife in endless torment.
She was loving and true and noble. She bore him sons
and daughters. In poverty, distress, and sickness she
stood by him with that self-denying and heroic tender
ness with which woman alone is gifted. She was the wife
of his bosom; but now, in hell, she leaps into the em
brace of devils. All this because she could accept the
Tweedledum of Consubstantiation, but not the Tweedledee of Transubstantiation. For this “ thou art com
forted” and she is “tormented.” So much for the
unspeakable happiness of “religious education.” I am
only an “ Infidel,” and only imperfectly appreciate it.
In fact, honesty impels me to make the impious admis
sion that I desire to be with my wife and children
wherever they are. I wish to be with them, whether
they be in Heaven, Hell, or Annihilation.
The “religious education” of your Eminence implies
subscription to the creed that, “ in the most holy Sacra
ments of the Eucharist, there are truly, really, and sub
stantially the body and blood, together with the soul and
divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ; and that there is made
a conversion of the whole substance of the bread into
the body and of the whole substance of the wine into
the blood.”* After you have eaten a slice of this God
who made the earth and then came down to it as a
joiner and made wheelbarrows, your “religious educa
tion ” advises those who have eaten hocus-pocussed Godand-joiner to pray as follows : “ May thy body, O Lord,
which I have received, and thy blood which I have
drank, cleave to my bowels, and grant that no stain of sin
may remain in me who have been fed with this pure and
holy sacrament.”! If I could humbly 'presume to
comment on a mystery so sacred, I should reverently
* “ Ordo Ministrandi Sacramenti.”
+ “ Missal for the Use of the Laity,” p. 30.
�16
“religious education.”
observe that, after you have eaten a world-maker and
wielder of a jack-plane, there is little wonder if he should
“ cleave ” to your “ bowels,” that you should be afflicted
with divine constipation ; but I should, with therapeutic
piety, suggest that you work off the god with Glauber salts
and the joiner with jalap. Is this blasphemous, your Emi
nence ? It is infinitely less blasphemous than your missal.
Mine is a drastic attempt to make men sane; yours is an
insidious attempt, in the interests of priestcraft, to keep
men cross-signing and genuflecting idiots.
Price Twopence.
Every Thursday.
THE
SECULAR
REVIEW:
A JOURNAL OF AGNOSTICISM.
EDITED BY SALADIN.
Order of your Newsagent, or send direct to the Publishers—W.
Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, London( E.C.
HISTORICAL PAMPHLETS.
A Reply to Cardinal Manning, by Saladin ...
The Crusades, by Saladin
The Covenanters, by Saladin
Christian Persecution, by Saladin ...
The Flagellants, by Saladin
The Iconoclasts, by Saladin
The Inquisition, Part I., by Saladin
...
The Inquisition, Part II., by Saladin
The Dancers, Shakers, and Jumpers, Part I., by Saladin
The Dancers, Shakers, and Jumpers, Part II., by Saladin
The Persecution of the Jews, Part I., by Saladin
The Persecution of the Jews, Part II., by Saladin
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NATIONAL SECULAR SOCT^ty
“Religious Education.”
A LETTER. TO
CARDINAL MANNING.
FART III.
WITH
ADDENDA.
London:
W. STEWART & Co., 41, FARRINGDON St., E.C.
��B 30?9
M5 <>7
“Religious Education.”
Have I recommended purgatives to work deity and
mechanic out of the enterics of saints? May I point
out, your Church, in its “ religious education,” proceeds
on somewhat similar lines ? I find, from a rubric in the
“ Roman Missal,”* what is to be done with Christ, pro
viding that the saint vomit him ! The blasphemy implied
in a “ poor worm of the dust ” retching away and
vomiting God is a hyperbole of sacrilege to which I
cannot aspire to reach, and I leave all the honour and
glory of it to the Roman Catholic Church. I find that,
according to the rubric (how unspeakable the advantages
of a “ religious education ” !), the vomit is to be kept in
“some sacred place” till it is “corrupted”—in other
words, till God is rotten. It is so considerate of your
Church to thus write down to the level of a sow—perhaps
the only creature besides a priest who could contemplate
without nausea first swallowing the Lord and then
vomiting him, and then looking for him in the vomit.
And your Eminence would like this emeticating of God,
prodding about for him in the vomit, finding him and
swallowing him over again, or not finding and, therefore
burning him and the vomit, and casting the ashes into
the sacristan to be taught at the expense of the rate
payers ! The ratepayers are mostly fools, and pay rates
and taxes with too little investigation into the why and
wherefore; and many of them are addicted to finding
Jesus. But they draw the line somewhere. They
have begun to draw the line at the priest who, in
order to “find Jesus,” prods about in a vomit with a
breakfast fork! Ugh! But no. This is nastiness to
be sure; but it is divine nastiness, and part and parcel of
* Published in Mechlin, 1840.
�4
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.'
a “ religious education.” Would it be etiquette, your
Eminence, for the person prodding about with the fork,
when he has discovered the half-digested wafer in the
vomit, to exclaim, “I have found Jesus!”
Then, your Eminence, the fine, cheerful doctrine of
Purgatory enters into the curriculum of a “ religious edu
cation.” In purgatory there is a nice, clear fire (ignis
)
*
for cooking souls. This nice, clear fire is exceedingly
useful; it enables you to rifle the pockets of a man’s
relations after he himself has been laid in his grave.
The fires in purgatory are just the sufficient heat for the
dead to enable you to extract half-crowns from the
pockets of the living.
Old Brown dies, his body is
buried, and you get certain fees over that; and his soul
canters off to purgatory. Young Brown would not mind
a cent about his dad being in purgatory, if you would
make the place at all comfortable for him ; but you
manage to make old Brown hot enough to make young
Brown pay to get him out. All this is very clever, and
very religious. St. Christina, who had been in purgatory,
and managed to come back to the earth again (possibly
for her umbrella), told your great and learned Cardinal
Bellarmine that “ the torments that I there witnessed
are so dreadful that to attempt to describe them would
be utterly in vain.” The place was found to be filled
with “ those who had repented indeed of their sins,
but had not paid the punishment due for them.’T After
this, from St. Christina to Bellarmine, who would be so
unfilial as to leave his father, or even his mother-in-law,
in purgatory ? Out they must come. The devout one
must “raise the wind ” to put out the fire. What man
who has the soul of a man would not pawn his braces;
what woman who has the heart of a woman would not
sell her garters, to get her dear dead out of such a hot
and damnable hole as the purgatory of Bellarmine? It
is set apart, it seems, for those who have repented of
their sins, but have not paid for them. Those who
have neither repented of their sins nor paid for them go
straight to hell; but that matters little : the temperature
* See Catechism on the fifth article of the Creed of Pope Pius IV,
t “ De Genitu Columbse,” bk. ii., ch. ix.
�RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.
5
is only a trifle higher, and a good, round, sound specimen
of a sinner can soon get accustomed to that. The great
thing is the pay. Pay, and it hardly matters a cinder
whether you repent or not. Yours is a grand and noble
Church, Cardinal Manning. It has the knack of getting
all possible moneys out of a man when he is alive, and,
through its purgatory, it can pursue the dead through
the very bottom of the grave, as it were, and shake him,
red-hot, flaming, and shrieking, in the eyes of the friends
he has left, that they may sell their very shirts to relieve
him of his agony. The one paid for leaps out from the
flames into the midst of heaven’s wings and harps, and
the gold and silver ring and rattle into the coffers of the
priest.
The Agnostic, alas, has no such facilities for turning
an honest penny. He does not know God sufficiently
to be able to induce him to enter into the swim with
him to help him to swindle and juggle. It is no use
any one trying to swindle on any exalted and profitable
scale, unless he has got God on his side, and does his
juggling in God’s name. All history and all experience
teach us that lesson with pious emphasis. I have not
God on my side, so all that I get is a little pittance for
my honest toil. I have no way of extracting cash for
the love of harps that have never been strung, and for
the fear of fires that have never been kindled. I am at
this disadvantage for not having acted up to the precepts
of a “religious education.”
Still, O Cardinal, if God be God—if he be noble and
generous and humane—you may stride up to him with
all the wealth and grandeur your Church has acquired,
and I will walk up into his presence with only this year’s
volume of the Secular Review under my arm. And, if
he say, “ Depart from me, ye cursed 1” it will be to you,
O Cardinal, and not to me. He will say, “ Give me a
shake of your hand, Saladin. You searched earnestly
and honestly for me, and could not find me ; but you
see I am here. You often studied and read all day, and
then burned the oil till long after midnight. Without
fee or reward, amid contumely and in obscurity, you
worked out your very life to teach others what you con
ceived to be right and true. To be mistaken, Saladin, is
�6
“religious
education.”
a small thing in the eyes of a God ; but to be honest is a
great thing. Read me some passages from ‘At Random
they are flashes from the immortal soul of a man
struggling in the dark ;• and passages written in the red
blood of an earnest human life are worthy the attention of
a God.”
I am, My Lord Cardinal,
Your Eminence’s
Obedient Servant,
Saladin.
�ADDENDA.
THE CHRISTIAN HEAVEN.
Bishop Croke of Cashell recently mounted the highest
stilts of sacred oratory, and dashed along thus, with his
head in New Jerusalem and his feet in Kildare :—
When we read in the fifteenth chapter of the Gospel according
to St. Luke that “there is more joy in heaven upon one sinner
that doeth penance than upon ninety-nine just who need not
penance,” we may very naturally be expected to say each one
within himself—Sin, then, must sadden God exceedingly, and cast
a gloom, so to speak, over the face of His angels ; because penance
that wipes sin away gives great gladness to God, fills with joy the
whole court of heaven, makes the loveliest seraph there smile yet
more sweetly, and Heaven itself become more heavenly still. Only
just think of it, brethren. There is the great God of the universe
sitting serenely, as we are used to picture him, on his throne of
state on high. Millions and hundreds of millions of angels
brighter far than the sun and infinitely more beautiful than the
moon stand ever-joyous sentinels around him. The ample domain
of,heaven itself, extending far and wide—yea, full many a mile
further than created eye can carry—encompasses him on every side.
It is lit up with lamps that know no dimness, and peopled with
happy spirits that are not destined to die. This earth is but an
atom in their sight. Wars, conflagrations, earthquakes, plague and
famine, and pestilence sweep over and decimate its inhabitants, and
Heaven heeds not the ruin that is tints made. Yet, strange to say,
one man, a poor weak worm of the earth, living on it, born of it,
and destined to return to it again in death, trangresses a law that
had been given to him by God for his guidance—thereby commit
ting sin—and behold the heart of the Most High is saddened, a
cloud comes across the countenance of his angels, and heaven itself
seems to be heaven no more. But, see, that same man repents;
that sinner is converted ; that rebel hand raised in pride against
the Almighty is uplifted no more, and, as the herald of God’s mercies
to man proclaims the glad tidings aloud, the music of heaven’s
choir becomes sweeter still; the light of heaven’s lamps becomes
brighter still ; the face of heaven’s angels becomes more smiling
still, for there is more joy in heaven upon one sinner that does
penance than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance.
�8
ADDENDA,
You see into that passage in Luke the Archbishop
has got his papist “penance” inserted where the
Protestant version has “repentance.” With the Pro
testant, “penance” is an heretical abomination. But
you observe the “word of God” is so explicit and simple
that it means either, or both, or neither. This vague
ambiguity is a distinguishing feature of divine writing.
If a man were to lose his reason, he could write tolerably
like God; and a man who has lost his reason, or who,
as is usually the case, had never any to lose, understands
best what God has been graciously pleased to write.
“ Sin,” according to Croke, and of course he knows
all about it, must “sadden God exceedingly.” A “sad”
deity, God-in-the-dumps, sitting on the white throne,
with all the beasts roaring “ Holy, holy, holy 1” and
glaring at him with the eyes they have in their tails and
their elbows, convinces me that Augustus Harris will
never produce a really effective pantomime at Drury
Lane till he has had the advantage of spending a week
in heaven. Would the great Croke, who seems to know
heaven and its denizens so intimately, inform me whether
the hebdomadal issue of this journal can “sadden God
exceedingly ” ? I know of no god, and I prefer to know
of none till I find one magnanimous and mighty enough
not to get “sad” at the writings of a weak mortal like
Saladin, or be pleased with the ranting but pious blarney
of a little sermon-spinner like Croke.
God used to be unchangeable. But that was in the
good old days, before Ireland and Croke were invented.
Now he gets “sad” whenever anybody sins; but grins
from ear to ear, and kicks up his holy heels with delight,
whenever anybody does penance. Pretty sudden and
fiequent transitions these for an unchangeable God.
But the authority is very high—the authority of his
friend, Croke of Cashel.
u
am „really sorry f°r
P00r dear angels with the
gloom on their faces. I once had a notion of becom
ing an angel myself by imitating, say, David, the man
“according to God’s own heart.” But now I give up
the project. There would always be somebody sinning,
and so my face would always be clouded with “gloom,”
except when somebody did penance—the only thing, by
�THE CHRISTIAN HEAVEN.
9
the-bye, that seems to throw a gleam of light into heaven.
This “ gloom ” would never do for me; I like a good
laugh now and again; and I can laugh, too, a loud hurri
cane of a laugh that shakes the rafters. So I will relin
quish my design of becoming an angel by imitating
David, and thereby some Uriah and some Joab will
escape murder and some Bathsheba dishonour.
Lord, how Croke does hit off heaven with only a few
spasms of his voice—the best voice going at wild rant
and mad tapsalteerie. Perhaps “ the loveliest seraphs
there would smile yet more sweetly” if I could get
beside them to tell them tales of heroic W allace instead
of stories about timid Jesus. By my halidome, I should
like to strut up the golden street—although I should
much rather stand up to the hurdies in Scottish heather
—and fling the strains of my mountain harp into the
ears of the belles of heaven. If they have blood in their
veins, I should send it tingling to the tips of their toes
and their wings. I should make the lyre of Caledonia
weep and moan and thunder and dirl till the harps that
hung on the willows by the streams of Babel would be
broken up and cast away.
Dr. Croke’s heaven, which is intended to be so attrac
tive to good Catholics and Land-Leaguers, does not
tempt me. I do not feel at all attracted to a great
ogre of a God, sitting on “ his throne of state on high,”
while “ millions and hundreds of millions of angels,
brighter far than the sun, and infinitely more beautiful
than the moon,” stand around him as “ sentinels.”
“ Sentinels,” indeed ! Surely these millions of angels
might be better employed. Millions of these celestial
monsters with wings, but whose tails are never men
tioned, stand “sentinel,” like the big horsemen at White
hall. Before I can be got to be really enamoured of
heaven, I should like to know how its flying monsters
get along without tails. A tail is to a bird what a rudder
is to a ship. I should like to be assured, before I consent
to go to heaven, that an angel can steer its course
accurately without a tail. I do not wish to go there and
incur the risk of some great, flying idiot coming dashing
up against me and knocking the teeth out of my head,
with a “Beg your pardon, Sir—pure accident; had
�IO
ADDENDA.
intended to fly to that there rafter 1” Besides, if these
angels are “ brighter far than the sun/’ I could not look
upon their splendour; so I should shortly be blind as
well as toothless.
In spite of the tremendous effulgence of Dr. Croke’s
angels, I observe that heaven is “lit up with lamps.”
Seeing that, in brilliance, every angel must be equal to
at least fifty sperm candles, I fail to see the use of the
lamps ; and I fear, as a canny Scot, I should demur
at the holy extravagance and the divine waste of paraffin.
At all events, fitting heaven up with lamps does not, as
far as I am concerned, add to its charms. There you
sit, pen in hand, all silent as death ■ and you in obstetric
t roes with one of your biggest thoughts, when crack
goes the glass chimney of the said lamp, and, in your
state of concentrated intensity, nearly startles your life
out. Besides, lamps are constantly getting upset, and,
if I were to upset one upon Sarah’s skirts or Rahab’s
polonaise, the effects might disconcert all heaven.
Besides, in trimming the wick, I usually burn my fingers,
and when I burn my fingers I usually swear ; and a good,
rattling malediction might tempt some outraged seraph
to throw me over heaven’s battlements into' the other
place, hurling the lamp after me.
But, O Bishop of Cashel, can all these millions
of angels find nothing better to do than to “stand
sentinel ” ? It may be all glory and brilliance with
;
but there are lanes and alleys with us where it is all
misery and gloom. The sties of Seven Dials are filled
with guilt and misery; over the fever slums of White
chapel falls the Shadow of Death.
Where are the
hundreds of millions of angels? From the dens of
Want and Stench and Disease rises the cry of Humanity;
but that cry reaches not the ears of the angels. Un
moved, they stand sentinel round their ogre God. Not
one angel breaks away from the phalanx to help the
gallant soul beaten down in life’s struggle, to drive away
want and shame from the home of the widow, to give
shelter to the destitute and bread to the fatherless.
The father which art in heaven ” cannot spare one
angel out of his hundreds of millions to visit his children
in mercy, and allay the gnawings of hunger and the pain
�THE CHRISTIAN HEAVEN.
11
of the heart that aches in misery. The music of every
harp, the sheen of every wing, is wanted “ for his own
glory.” No angel can be spared to stand between the
maiden and the deceiver. No angel can be sent for a
moment to kiss the desperately-parted lips and smooth
down the wildly-dishevelled hair of her, the lost and
ruined, as she mounts the parapet of the bridge to leap
from the street and Shame into the river and Death.
No angel comes down with the lightning in his hand to
strike the rich man dead as, by dint of his gold, from
the pale arms of Famine he forces the embraces of
Love.
A hundred thousand men, in uniform, are struggling
in yonder valley. A chorus goes to hell of the yells
of madness, the groans of anguish, and the screams of
agony. The gulf of smoke is torn by torrents and bursts
of fire, and shaken by louder than the thunders of
God. Weary with slaughter, his feet entangled in his
brother’s entrails, the powder-blackened madman falls.
He clutches at the red grass and the heaps of reeking
butchery, and gurgles and gasps and drowns in his
brother’s blood. And the horror and the agony are not
all here. Circling away into the busy towns, the quiet
villages, the corn fields, and the apple orchards of other
lands, extends the tide of misery and woe. Far away
from the field of carnage, hunger overtakes the orphan
child. The aged mother has lost her son, and the
young girl her lover. Over hundreds of leagues of the
world rises the voice of mourning and lamentation and
woe. Damn the heartless god that required all his idle
angels when his children down here went mad 1 Out of
the vast multitude, could he spare not a single one to
stand between these two hosts, and stay that hurricane
of lead; not one to stop these levelled bayonets and
that crunch of steel—that grinding of the bloody wheels
of the mills of Death ?
Is this God—this omnipotent fiend who could make
us, his poor children on earth here, holy and happy, and
will not ? Then let me, his son, flee from such a father
to the uttermost rim of the universe. Is this heaven,
where immortals stand as a retinue of sentinels, unmoved
by the tears of man’s misery and the cries of human
�12
ADDENDA.
pain ? Is this heaven—the happiest sphere we are to
enter when the gate of the grave closes behind us ? Then
proclaim it from the housetops that there is no heaven,
that all that is is a universal hell, and that man is the
plaything of an inscrutable fiend.
When will gushing gospel-mongers learn that, in spite
of its “loveliest seraphs” smiling as sweetly as they can
be made to do in Bishop Croke’s pious rhetoric, heaven
is not good enough for nineteenth-century men and
women. It did ■well enough as a more or less delirious
day-dream for centuries that are no more, for those who
have Jain in the grave so long that it would require
chemical analysis to distinguish the marrow of thefemorbone from the rust of the coffin-nail.
Shades of the dead, whose essence, in a sublime
panontism, has gone to feed the tissues of the universe,
we mean no disrespect to you when we reject your heaven.
It is upon the mountain,formed by the bonesofa departed
world, we stand, in order to see further than that departed
world ever saw. It is not the cerebration inside our indivi
dual skull, but the fact of our standing upon a more than
Tamerlane pyramid of skulls, that throws our vision
further down the vista of Mystery. The former coral
zoophytes laid their deposits on the sea-bed and under the
wave; on their deposits we place ours, thanks to them,
not in the dark like theirs, but up in the light, where the
sun shines, where the clouds roll and unroll, where the
wind blows and the billows thunder and s ing. We are
no longer away down among heavens and hells, the rocks
and algae of the ocean’s floor, but up in the light, where
the sea-birds scream, where the blue smoke from our
hearth melts away calmly over the deep green of the
trees, where the waters are wooed by olive boughs and
kissed by riparian myrtles, and flowers fling the glory of
their fragrance over the lake of the atoll.
Away with your heaven and other submarine night
mares of the world before sunrise. All hail a new
heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness !
Emerged at length from the deep, we are religious, but
our religion has burst asunder the fetters of your
theology; we are pious, but we visit your temples with
fire and desolation ; we are worshipful, but we urge on the
car of Progress over the shattered fragments of your gods.
�CHIVALRY.
13
CHIVALRY.
They knelt ’fore the altar’s gilded rail,
The beautiful and the brave,
In the dim old abbey down in the vale,
O’er high-born dust in the grave.
And martyr holy and tortured saint
Were limned on the glorious pane,
And the sunbeams threw on the carvings quaint
A golden and crimson stain.
And the organ peal shook the dead in their grave,
And the incense smoke died away
Down the dim-lit chancel and solemn nave
Where the dead in their marble lay.
The orange wreath in the morning’s breath,
And the warrior’s nodding plume,
In the hoary cloister smiled at Death
And the warp and the weft of Doom.
And the noblest blood in the land was there—
The chivalrous sword and mail;
And the naked breasts of the Norman fair
Throbbed around that altar’s rail.
And the father leant on his battle brand,
And the mother dropped a tear,
And De Wilton’s Edith laid her hand
In the gauntlet of De Vere.
And the bridal ring and the muttered words,
And the gems and the plumes of pride,
And the whispers low, and the clank of swords,
And De Wilton’s girl was a bride.
*
*
*
*
Heir to wide lands, she bore him a son
On a sweet and a silent day :
Where the breach was won, and lost, and won,
De Wilton was far away.
�14
addenda.
And he wore her glove by his mangled plume
And her kiss on his lip still lay,
1
nd his blade flashed dread as the bolt of Doom
From the morn till the noon of day.
Wherever raved wildest the storm of blades,
And the red rain bloodiest fell
Wherever thickest the troops of shades
Were hurled to the realms of Hell
°e Vere’s blue flag with his Edith’s hair
Waved in the reeling van,
And rose and fell, ’mid groan and yell,
In the chaos of horse and man.
It sank at last in the hurricane
That raged round the knights of De Vere
And the world span round his reeling brain ’
Laid bare by a foeman’s spear.
Hearts rained out blood, helms glinted fire
Mid the death groan and hurraa •
An^ kn,ghthood’s pride toiled, tugged, and died
Wheie the spangled banner lay.
For Edith s hair on that broidered soy
Lay trampled in dust and gore;
And Rudolph had sworn to bear it with joy
bo her bower or return no more.
He sprang with a shout from the reeling sod
A gash on his helmless brow,
Raised his red hand aloft to God,
And hissed his dauntless vow :
“Ye saints,” quoth he, “this soy’s my shroud,
Or I bear it to Edith again !”■_
_
BUA.^ld
tbe burst of the thunder-cloud,
Or the dash of the roaring main,
The foe swept on ten thousand strong
O’er Rudolph’s wounded ten;
&
quakes, the mountain shakes
Neath the tramp of armed men.
And vassal thralls with husky cheer
Rush o’er the banner fair,
�CHIVALRY.
15
The blazoned scutcheon of De Vere
And Edith’s golden hair.
Firm faced the host the glorious ten
For Edith, God, and Home—
Swung the angry sea of ten thousand men—
Dashed the battle’s bloody foam.
*
*
*
*
His horse lay on the carnage ground,
Upon that flag of woe ;
His mangled vassals lay around,
And Rudolph lay below,
’Mid battered helm and shivered lance,
And corslet, helm, and glave;
And all the wrecks of War’s wild dance
When waltzing to the grave.
*
*
*
*
Sighed o’er the field the young morn’s breath :
The foemen found him there,
His pale lips pressed in ghastly death
To Edith’s crimsoned hair.
They laid him down by the side of her bed,
The monks who his body bore;
His eyes had the glare of the eyes of the dead,
His armour was dyed in gore.
A friar essayed the ladye to cheer
Jn the mournful tidings of ill;
But the faithful heart of the bride of De Vere
Ever, forever was still.
Though the babe still lay on the high, white breast
That milk to its dear lips gave,—Years laid him again on that bosom to rest,
When he fell in the ranks of the brave. ’
*
*
*
*
She followed her lord to the halls of God
Ere that sorrowful day was done;
For her lord had died on the trampled sod :
To a corpse she had borne her son.
�i6
ADDENDA.
Now the sire and the dame and their gallant boy
All rest ’neath the marble there,
And over them waves the banner of soy,
With Edith’s blood-stained hair.
And swords have clashed to the valiant tale,
And the voice of the minstrel sung,
How fair were the maids, how deadly the blades,
When the heart of the world was young !
price Twopence.
Every Thursday.
THE
SECULAR
REVIEW:
A JOURNAL OF AGNOSTICISM.
EDITED BY SALADIN.
Order of your Newsagent, or send direct to the Publishers—W.
Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, London. E.C.
HISTORICAL PAMPHLETS.
A Reply to Cardinal Manning, by Saladin ...
...
The Crusades, by Saladin
...
...
...
The Covenanters, by Saladin
...
...
...
Christian Persecution, by Saladin ...
...
...
The Flagellants, by Saladin
...
...
...
The Iconoclasts, by Saladin
...
...
...
The Inquisition, Part I., by Saladin
...
...
The Inquisition, Part II., by Saladin
...
...
The Dancers, Shakers, and Jumpers, Part I., by Saladin
The Dancers, Shakers, and Jumpers, Part II., bySaladin
The Persecution of the Jews, Part I., by Saladin
...
The Persecution of the Jews, Part II., by Saladin
...
01
o 1
o x
o x
o x
o x
0 I
o 1
o 1
o 1
01
01
London : W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C.
�
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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"Religious education" : a letter to Cardinal Manning
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Ross, William Stewart [1844-1906]
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An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 3 v. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Ross's reply to a sermon preached by Cardinal Manning on 26 September, 1885. Includes bibliographical references. "by Saladin" [title page]. Saladin is the pseudonym of William Stewart Ross. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
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Education
Religion
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Henry Edward Manning
NSS
Religious Education
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KINDER GARTEN TRAINING.
A PAPER
BEAD AT THE SOCIAL SCIENCE CONGBESS,
AT
GLASGOW, 1874..
BY
E. A. MANNING.
LONDON:
EDWARD STANFORD* 6, 7, & 8, CHARING CROSS, S.W.
■
1874.
Price Sixpence.
��KINDER GARTEN TRAINING.
In the last few years the Kinder Garten system of
training infants, invented by Frobel, has been
noticed and studied by many who are interested
in practical education. Introduced into England
more than twenty-five years ago, this method at
first attracted little attention; but now Frobel’s
idea in its beauty and harmony has taken strong
hold of many minds, and the value of his plans,
which are so skilfully adapted to children’s tenden
cies, is gradually being more and more recognised.
Private Kinder Gartens are springing up in various
places; school boards begin to establish them
as a preparation for the elementary course; while
in Manchester there is already a training school
for teachers. In Frobel’s own country, the number
of Kinder Gartens has increased to five hundred.
Some of his pupils (among them the Baroness Marenholtz-Bulow) have devoted themselves zealously to
their establishment; and from Germany teachers
have been sent to Italy, where the system has great
success. In Belgium, France, and Russia, children
are being brought under this influence. In the
United States, greatly through the exertions of Miss
Peabody, Kinder Gartens are becoming numerous.
B
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Many good G-uides too have been published, the
result of actual experience in teaching, the best of
which are by Wiebe, Kohler, Goldammer, Octavie
de Masson and Madame Ronge ; and Miss Peabody
edits a little monthly magazine, called the 4 Kinder
Garten Messenger.’*
But, notwithstanding this progress, we still hear
it asked what Kinder Gartens are; and even those
who are familiar with the occupations and games
often do not well understand Frobel’s leading ideas.
The principle of his system seems still to be too
much in the background, whereas it is just that
which ought to be entered into, if we wish to judge
fairly of the merits of his plans. In this paper,
then, I shall first explain Frobel’s principle, in doing
which I shall have to say a little about himself;
and secondly, I shall describe the practical system
of training which he invented in accordance with
that principle.
I. Frobel’s fundamental idea of education was
that it consists in securing a gradual and harmo
nious development of the child’s nature. And how
is this to be obtained ? His answer is, “ Not by a
routine course of school lessons, but by the pleasur
able, well-directed exercise of its various faculties.”
He saw that children are growing and learning,
even if they are not sent to school. But he did
1 This magazine can be procured in England by communicating with
Miss Snell, 17, Strawberry Bank, Pendleton, Manchester.
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not wish them to be left to themselves. He saw
also that the help of experienced minds is needed,
in order to guide and train all this natural action.
The work of teachers, therefore, lies first in observing
children’s own efforts, and next in directing those
efforts to good and sure results. Self-education
thus assisted, and thus only, leads to the desired
end—the free and full development of the physical,
mental, and moral nature. Frobel was not the
first to assert these views about education, and
he shared them with Pestalozzi and others of his
time; but being deeply impressed with them, he,
like Pestalozzi, spent a great part of his life in
carrying them into practice. The son of a country
pastor in Thiiringen, he tried several kinds of em
ployment, till the decided bent of his mind towards
teaching induced him to help in a school at Frank
fort, and afterwards he collected some village boys
not far from his early home, with the desire of
training them to lead good and useful lives. He
had not then thought of Kinder Gartens, but he
conducted his school on the principle that I have
stated, viz. that true education is simply the careful
guidance of natural growth.
After some years, Frobel, having fully taken
hold of this principle of aided self-development,
began to consider whether it could not be acted on
before the usual school age. He became convinced
that the first few years of a child’s life are alb
b
2
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important, as laying the foundation of health and
disease, giving the direction to its mental habits,
and moulding its tempers, dispositions, and tastes.
In dealing with his boy-pupils, he was led to see
that he might have had far more success with them
if they had not been comparatively neglected up
to seven years old. Like Pestalozzi, he had the
highest appreciation of early home-training, and
he had no desire to set infants to tasks. But it
occurred to him that if the education which they
were joyously giving themselves could be gently
and kindly guided by a teacher, under suitable
conditions, and with the advantage of companion
ship, mind and body might be brought into a good
state of preparation for the studies and the duties of
after years. Thus he arrived at the idea of Kinder
Gartens.
It is easy to see how naturally the name Kinder
Garten was adopted by Frobel. In all his thoughts
on education the illustration constantly present to
his mind was that of the growth of plants. He used
to say, “ The tree is my teacherand he held the
work of the gardener to be very similar to that of
the educator. In an often-quoted passage he ex
presses himself thus : “ As the farmer and gardener
treat their seeds in accordance with Nature, and in
harmony with her laws, so we should educate the
child and man according to their being, according
to the inherent laws of life, in harmony and unity
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with Nature and with the Supreme Being, Source of
all life.” The gardener imparts no force, establishes
no laws, but after making himself acquainted with
the nature of the plants under his care, secures for
them, by his watchful toil, plenty of light, air, water,
and space, sure that the leaves, flowers, and fruit
will appear in due time. And so, in the case of
children, the teacher first acquires a true ideal of
what they may become, and afterwards simply
gives scope for the quickening and strengthening
of their varied capacities. When then Frobel had
planned a training place for infants, he called it a
childrens garden, expressing thus his educational
principle, and conveying a beautiful idea of the
kind of influences to be exerted there, such influ
ences as may reasonably be compared to the sun
shine, rain, and good soil by means of which plants
thrive and grow. I may add that no forcing is con
sistent with his system. Open-air gardening he
accepted as a comparison, but not the artificial
methods which promote rapid results; for he knew
that all healthy development is slow.
But Frobel would have certainly failed in his
practical schemes if he had not thoroughly under
stood children, and one cannot help being struck
with the wholeness of his view as to their nature.
He seems to leave out no characteristic—to forget
no latent power. The child that he already trains
in imagination is just the merry, happy, bright,
�<
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)
inventive, active, loving child that everyone de
lights to see. Himself of an affectionate disposition,
he could sympathize with the desires and interests
of the youngest minds; and when he was forming
his plans of training, he used to mix much with
little children, noticing their ways with one another,
and the ways with them of their mothers and nurses.
And besides kindness and simplicity of heart, he
brought to bear on the subject of education a keen
and philosophic mind. He observed not only
children, but men and nations too; and he found
that facts in individual growth were confirmed by
facts in the more extended growth of communities.
He thought deeply on all human relations and
duties, seeking everywhere for unity in variety,
and for harmony through obedience to Divine laws.
Gentle, thoughtful, poetical, and religious-minded,
he was well qualified to show how children should
be prepared for life, and I think it is rare to meet
with anyone who, as fully as he did, realized all
their characteristics.
What did he find those characteristics to be ? I
will shortly enumerate the chief of them. 1. An
unceasing bodily activity, which leads children to
jump, run, climb, tumble, and scramble about—the
natural means of promoting physical growth. 2. An
inquisitive faculty of observation, impelling them to
investigate the world in which they are come to live,
with the untiring energy of African explorers; and
Frobel saw that they do this in a most practical
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manner, mainly by feeling and handling the objects
of their attention. 3. Constructiveness-, the fond
ness for making things, whether mud-pies, boats, or
dolls’ clothes. ‘ 4. A love of the beautiful, shown
in a susceptibility to the influence of harmony in
sound, form, and colour, and of all external nature.
5. The social tendency ; the delight of having com
panions, and of being sympathized with in their
joys and troubles.
6. A constant playfulness,
evinced by the glee and enthusiasm which animate
their hourly life. Frobel dwelt much on this point;
for he felt that play (by which, however, he did not
mean aimless play) is the congenial atmosphere of a
little child. 7. A growing moral nature—passions,
affections, and conscience, which need to be con
trolled, responded to, and cultivated. Here then
are seven distinctive characteristics, common in
varying degrees to all children, and it was these
that Frotel determined to try to develop.
I have now described the foundation on which
Frobel built his Kinder Garten teaching, viz. the
principle that true education consists in the judicious
guidance of self-education; and I have shown, too,
that he desired to apply this principle to the train
ing of very young children, and that his acquintance
with a child’s nature was remarkably full and com
plete.
II. Secondly, I will briefly describe Frobel’s prac
tical plans, which have already been so widely
adopted.
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8
)
1. .The Gifts. Impressed with the idea that a
little child must begin to learn through the handling
of objects, and also through play, he arranged a
series of toys which he called gifts. These are as
different as possible from the dazzling mechanisms
that attract children to the windows of toy-shops.
Frobel studiously avoided recommending toys which,
being finished off, leave no room for the exercise of
fancy. I think he would have sighed over the Christ
mas and birthday presents that are now showered
upon children. But modest as his gifts are in appear
ance, they have an endless capability for giving enjoy-,
ment, and enjoyment of a higher kind than the gay
little omnibus, or the talking French doll. Children’s
eyes glisten with pleasure when they are allowed
to play with them, and the teacher, by their use,
stimulates the observing and inventive powers, and
conveys the rudiments of arithmetic and geometry.
There is a regular gradation in the gifts, most care
fully thought out by Frobel, by means of which
each dawning faculty is provided for, and the child
is led from the most elementary ideas to the more
abstract and complicated. The first gift is a coloured
worsted ball. Being apparently full of life, a ball
is a real companion for an infant. It not only
amuses it, and helps to teach command of limbs and
muscles, but it supplies the groundwork of first
lessons about colour and substance. Very pretty
symmetrical games can be played with this gift, to
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music or counting ; as, for instance, by placing the
children in a circle, and letting them pass the balls
from one to another, the arms being raised and
lowered alternately. The second gift consists of a
plain wooden ball or sphere, a cube, and a cylinder.
The child is now led to observe new forms, and
becomes familiar with corners, sides, edges, and
angles. The third and fourth gifts are again in
advance. Each is a cube, divided in the one case
into eight smaller cubes, in the other into eight
parallelograms. Frobel planned three modes of use
for these blocks and bricks: making forms of daily
life, such as a chair, a tower, a column, &c.; making
forms of beauty—flat shapes which in a simple and
striking way can be evolved out of one another (in
one of the Kinder Garten Guides as many as eighty
of these are given)—and using them for lessons
about number. The fifth and sixth gifts are further
subdivided, and are therefore available for more
elaborate erections and figures. They also lead to
higher arithmetical and mathematical teaching.
Sometimes all the sets of bricks are used together,
so that bridges, houses, railroads, &c., can be formed.
The children are in every way encouraged to exercise
their own invention, and the teacher talks to them
familiarly about the objects represented.
2. The Occupations. The value of these is proved
by the great delight that they afford, the ingenuity
that they call forth, and the habits of industry that
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they encourage. Everyone who has visited a Kinder
Garten when the occupations were going on, must
have remarked the- zest of the children, and their
proud surprise at the results of their own perse
verance. I can only name them, without indicating
the clever way in which they also lead up to one
another. The first is stick-laying, that is, making
outline forms with tiny sticks; then drawing, which
begins with the representation of these outlines on
a slate, and goes on to the copying of the forms of
printed letters and of natural objects. Pea-work;
uniting the sticks by means of softened peas, so as
to make little articles of furniture, as well as mathe
matical figures. Paper-folding, by which a succes
sion of objects are formed out of a sheet of paper.
Paper-cutting; a few symmetrical cuts when the
paper has been folded into a triangle, giving an
astonishing variety of results. Perforating of card
board, the designs when finished being worked by
the children with worsted. Mat-making; the inter
weaving of coloured strips of paper so as to make
little mats. Lastly, Modelling in clay. This begins
with the simplest forms, but by degrees the children
learn to imitate nature, and they often show great
skill in these early attempts at sculpture. The occu
pations not only satisfy the desire to make something,
but they develop the artistic faculty. As Frobel
looked in the child for the germ of every capacity of
the grown man, he did not fail to give scope for the
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expression of ideas through creations of fancy. He
stands perhaps alone in attempting the cultivation
of art-power in very young children. I may mention
here that he made a great point of accustoming
children to express themselves in clear tones, and
in language closely fitted to their thought, and also
that reading is taught in Kinder Gartens by a natural
method, which avoids the labour of spelling. The
power of accurate observation gained by so much
familiarity with form, makes a child attain the art
of reading with singular ease and rapidity.
3. Another part of the training consists in laying
the basis of Scientific Knowledge. The child’s atten
tion is drawn to objects. He is led to distinguish their
likenesses and their differences, according to the Pestalozzian method, and thus he acquires the elements
of geography, physics, and natural history. Frobel
would not allow such teaching to be given in a dry
manner. He wished a garden to be attached to
every one of these schools, that the children might
study for themselves the nature of plants, and he liked
them to live as much as possible in the open air, and
to have the care of flowers and of animals. In the
lessons, the teacher chooses subjects connected with
the children’s daily experience, and has recourse to
pictures and anecdotes. Science, while unimpaired
as to accuracy, is conveyed through the medium of
poetry and affection. For the knowledge is imparted
in order to satisfy the child’s eager wish to be at
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)
home in nature, and to take his rightful place in
relation to the outer world.
4. Music was much relied on by Frobel, for he
had a profound belief in its beneficial influence. He
remarked that the youngest children have a tendency
to express themselves in singing, and he was aware
of the almost magical effect on their moral nature of
melodious sounds. He therefore introduced music,
with or without words, in every available way into
his system. As harmony was his constant end and
aim, no wonder that the harmony of sound had a
special attraction for him.
5. Again, the Games are very prominent in a
Kinder Garten. These are of a dramatic kind,
tending to remind children of phases of life and of
the ways of animals, and being performed by a
large number, and in rhythmic order, their effect is
animating and harmonizing. As an example, I will
describe the game called “ The Pigeon-house.”
Three-fourths of the children place themselves in a
circle round the others, who represent the pigeons.
Those outside begin to sing-T
“We open the pigeon-house again,
And. set the merry flutt’rers free ”—
at the same time enlarging the circle, and raising
hands and arms, so as to allow the pigeons to
escape. The pigeon-children run out, imitating the
flapping of birds’ wings, and the song continues—
“ They fly on the fields and grassy plain,
Delighted with joyous liberty.”
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After a while, the circle goes on to sing—
“ And when they return from their merry flight,
We shut up the house, and bid them ‘good-night.’”
At once the pigeons run back, pass under the raised
arms of the circle, and are closed in again. Other
plays are “ The Peasant,” “ The Windmill,” “ The
Bees,” &c. It is quite inspiriting to see the mer
riment caused by these games. The children’s
imagination is pleased; their limbs are healthily
and gracefully exercised; they are exhilarated by
companionship; and they learn to realize the value
of combination for the production of results.
6. There is one more point that I must refer to.
It is the moral training that a Kinder Garten
supplies. The teacher aims indirectly at placing a
moral standard before the children’s minds, by the
tone she gives to all the lessons, and through
biographies, fables, songs, and stories, illustrative of
right and wrong. But, besides this, she watches
and guides their conduct. Owing to the freedom of
action encouraged, and the social life that the
presence of numbers gives, there is plenty of scope
for the growth of character; and the teacher, whose
approbation, if she is loved by her pupils, is earnestly
desired, has it in her power continually to promote
unselfishness, and to check cross and angry disposi
tions. The occupations induce perseverance and
correct idleness; in the games the children learn to
give up to others; patience, self-control, and a love
�of order are imbibed; it becomes a habit to respect
the rights of others; the affections are drawn out;
and cheerful obedience is accepted as the rule of
life. If in a word or two one had to describe the
moral effect of a Kinder Garten, one might say that
the child learns there the great lesson that it forms
a part of a social whole. Each has its little niche
in the building—its small, but definite, share of
duty, which, if it omits to perform, all the others
suffer. Thus, for the sake of its companions, it
represses its hasty words and its violent tempers,
and tries to help towards the general advantage.
It is caught up, as it were, into some degree of
understanding of its religious and moral relations,
and the aim set before it is not only not to be
naughty, but to be positively good.
In these ways Frobel adapted his practice to
the several characteristics of children which I have
already enumerated—to their activity, observingness,
constructiveness, love of art, sociability, playfulness,
and their moral nature. Other occupations and
other methods of teaching may, as experience
-increases, be added to his, but while there is no
reason to follow his plans slavishly, I think it will
not be found easy to improve upon them. Of course,
it depends mainly on the teacher whether a Kinder
Garten accomplishes its true intention, and some of
the objections that one occasionally hears raised
against the system apply, I believe, to the many
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imperfect realizations that unfortunately exist.
The important thing is that a teacher should be
thoroughly imbued with Frobel’s principle. No
doubt she requires special training in the use of the
gifts, and in the games and occupations, &c. But
she will have studied them to little avail if she
treats them as unrelated mechanical arts, instead
of as helps to the carrying out of a whole ideal.
For Frobel’s system is, after all, not a system. It
is life acting on life. It is the calling forth of the
emotions, the intellect, the physical powers, and the
conscience by one in whom all good faculties are
already developed. The teacher must keep her
principles constantly in view, and must test every
portion of her practice by its conformity to that
principle. Through a wise and loving influence she
must prepare her impressible little pupils for further
progress, and if she has trained them as Frobel
meant them to be trained, they will begin their
school life with a happy and regulated consciousness
of possessing force—physical, intellectual, and
moral.
In order to show that these results may be and
are actually obtained, I will quote the recent testi
mony of an elementary schoolmistress, in America,
who receives children at the end of their Kinder
Garten course. She wrote:—“ A child, of no extra
ordinary gifts, who had been in Miss Kriege’s
Kinder Garten two years, came to me at seven, and
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easily passed through all the three grades of the
primary school in one year, because all his habits of
mind were so well formed, and he had been taught
both how to behave and how to learn.”
In conclusion, I would express a hope not only
that Kinder Gartens will become more and more
numerous, but also that Frobel’s principle will be
recognised to a greater extent than it is at present,
in the later stages of education.
E. A. Manning.
<
V*
Since this paper was prepared, I am glad to find
that the British and Foreign School Society have
engaged the help of an experienced German lady,
Miss Heerwart, a pupil of Frobel’s intimate friend
and colleague, Middendorff, > in order to organize a
course of Kinder Garten instruction for the students
of Stockwell College. Until the present want of
trained English teachers is supplied, it is impos
sible that the system can make much progress; but
as soon as it is introduced, in a thorough manner,
into training institutions, we may hope that children
of all classes will share those advantages of develop
ment which must ever be associated with the name
of Friedrich Frobel.
���
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Kinder garten training: a paper read at the Social Science Congress at Glasgow, 1874
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Manning, E.A.
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 16 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Discusses the work of educator Friedrich Frobel who created the concept of 'kindergarten'.
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Edward Stanford
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1874
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Education
Child rearing
Conway Tracts
Education
Friedrich Frobel
Kindergartens
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Text
JEWISH LITERATURE
AND
MODERN EDUCATION:
OR,
THE USE AND MISUSE OF THE BIBLE IN
THE SCHOOLROOM.
BEING TWO LECTURES DELIVERED BEFORE THE SUNDAY LECTURE
SOCIETY, MARCH 26th AND APRIL 2d 1871.
PUBLISHED FOR THE AUTHOR,
BT
THOMAS SCOTT, RAMSGATE.
Price One Shilling and Sixpence, stitched.
On better paper and bound in cloth, Two Shillings and Sixpence.
�“ These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that
they
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searched the Scriptures daily, whether those
things were so.”—Acts xvii. 11.
�PREFACE.
Whether or not the Solution, given in these Lectures,
of the “Religious Difficulty” in our National Education,
be acceptable for practical application, is a question other
than that of the intrinsic soundness of that Solution.
It is to this only that my responsibility extends. The
responsibility of declining to accept a proffered remedy
must rest with those to whom the offer is made.
I had intended to keep these Lectures in manuscript,
and repeat them wherever an audience might be found
desirous of hearing facts stated without respect to aught
but the facts. It is in compliance with very many
and pressing solicitations that I have, by printing them,
withdrawn them from further delivery as Public Lectures.
My hope now is that the readers will not be less nume
rous than the hearers would have been, had I adhered
to my original intention.
The Lectures are printed with the changes made on
their second delivery, in Edinburgh.
I cannot let them
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Preface.
go from me without acknowledging my obligations to
the series of small publications issued periodically by
Mr Thomas Scott of Ramsgate, to whose indefatigable
self-devotion to the cause of “ Free Inquiry and Free
Expression,” the present rapid spread of information,
and consequent movement of thought on religious
matters, especially among the clergy of the Establish
ment,—(a movement far greater than the public is aware
of)—is in no small degree attributable. The tracts
entitled, The Defective Morality of the New Testament, by
Professor F. W. Newman; The Gospel of the Kingdom,
and The Influence of Sacred History on the Intellect and
Conscience,—especially deserve mention for the use I
have made of them.
A few brief passages given as
quotations, but without reference, are for the most part
taken, with more or less exactness, from The Pilgrim and
the Shrine.
E. M.
London, September 1871.
�SYNOPSIS.
LECTURE THE FIRST.
KOri 3TIOS
.11.
J2.
.83.
i4.i 5.
’ .‘< 6.
7.
- , J 8..
: .(9.
INTRODUCTION,
.....
DEFINITION AND FUNCTION OF EDUCATION,
THE SCHOOL BOARDS AND THE “RELIGIOUS DIFFICULTY,”
THE GENESIS AND HABITAT OF THE “DIFFICULTY,”
THE BIBLE AS A MORAL TEACHER,
THE BIBLE AS AN INTELLECTUAL TEACHER,
THE BIBLE “WITHOUT NOTE OR COMMENT,”
THE GOSPELS AND THE CHARACTER OF JESUS,
.
THE “KINGDOM OF HEAVEN,”
1
3
6
11
12
24
27
35
37
LECTURE THE SECOND.
.0110.
ill.
THE NEW TESTAMENT AS A RULE OF LIFE AND FAITH,
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41
THE “CONTINUITY OF SCRIPTURE,” DOCTRINAL AND
OTHER,
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12. WHY THE BIBLE SHOULD BE TAUGHT IN OUR SCHOOLS, .
57
13. HOW IT SHOULD BE DEALT WITH,
.
.
.65
;14. “notes and comments;” the principle of thf.tr
CONSTRUCTION,
.....
69
115. BIBLICAL INFALLIBILITY,
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.
.74
16. BIBLICAL INSPIRATION,
.
.
.
.78
17. THE BIBLE AND MODERN COMMENTATORS,
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.
86
>18. THE BIBLE AND MODERN PRACTICE,
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19. THE SCHOOL AND TEACHER OF THE FUTURE, .
.
94
��LECTURE THE FIRST.
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I.
Why is it with, us in England, that with all our achieve
ments in Science, Literature, and Art; in Government,
Industry, and Warfare; in Honour, Religion, and Virtue;
with conquests ranging over the whole threefold domain
of Humanity, the Physical, the Intellectual, and the
Moral,—why is it that the moment we attempt to ex
tend the manifold blessings of our civilisation to the
entire mass of our countrymen, we find ourselves at fault
and utterly baffled 1
Long has the condition of myriads among us been
known to be terrible in its degradation. Long have we
acknowledged an earnest desire to raise them out of that
condition. Measure after measure have we devised and
enacted; but none of them, not even the vast Church
establishment of the realm, has proved in any degree
commensurate with the evil. At length our efforts have
culminated in the elaboration and enactment of one
comprehensive scheme; and we have proceeded so far as
to have elected as our representatives to carry it into
effect, those of us whom, for superior intelligence and
energy, we deem best qualified for the task.
Shortlived, however, do our exultant hopes promise to
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be. The very agents of our beneficent intentions, the
Schoolboards, in whose hands are borne the germs of our
redemption and future civilisation, are altogether at such
odds within themselves upon some of the leading and
most essential principles, that the scheme threatens
wholly to collapse in disheartening failure, or to become
a perennial source of bitterness and dissension.
Is it not passing strange ? Based though our culture
has for centuries been, upon one and the self-same book,
so far from our having attained any degree of unity
thereby, we are divided and rent into sects and factions
innumerable and irreconcilable, until it would appear as
if the very spirit of that proverbially perverse and stiff
necked people whose sacred literature we have adopted
as the rule of our faith and practice, had passed into
ourselves and become a constituent part of our very
nature.
The greatness of the emergency,—for it is the redemp
tion of our masses from pauperism, ignorance, and bar
barism that is at stake,—not justifies merely, but impe
ratively demands the strenuous collaboration of all who,
having the good of their kind at heart, have made this
question one of special investigation. It is in no spirit
of hasty presumption,—scarcely is it with much hope of
wide acceptance,—at least in the present,—that I have
responded to the invitation to recite here to-day the con
clusions to which my study of the points at issue has
brought me. Rather is it that it will be a relief to my
self to have thrown off the reflections and results which,
in a somewhat varied experience at home and abroad,
have accumulated upon me, and to feel that I have done
this at the time when there is most chance of their being
useful. It is thus that I have prepared my contribution
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towards the solution of “ the Religious Difficulty ” which
lies “ a lion in the path ” of our National Education and
all our national improvement, showing as- yet not the
smallest symptom of discomposure through any “ Reso
lution ” of Metropolitan or other School-board.
II.
In all emergencies, whether of conduct or of opinion,
where there is doubt and space for deliberation, it is
best to go back to the very beginning of the matter, and
there, in its initial principles, seek the clue which is to
conduct us safely out of our dilemma. It is wonderful
sometimes how readily a skein is disentangled when
once the right end of the thread has been found. Our
friends across the Atlantic, the Americans, were for a long
time disastrously hampered in their attempts at legisla
tion. It is not surprising that it should have been so,
when we consider that the principal object of legislation
is Man, and that the two great sections of the American
community differed altogether in their definition of Man;
the one holding that persons who had dark complexions
and a peculiar kind of rough curly hair, several millions
of whom lived in the country, were not men L and the
other holding that they were just as much entitled to be
treated as human beings as people with light complexions
and smooth hair. At length, after many years of bitter
quarrelling, ending with one of the most fearful inter
necine conflicts ever known, it was agreed to regard all
people as human, and to legislate alike for them with per
fect equality; whereupon the difficulty entirely vanished,
and the course of the nation became smooth and easy.
In like manner our difficulties, in regard to popular
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instruction, have all arisen through our neglect of a de
finition. We have not defined to ourselves the precise
object of the system of National Education, which, after
generations of anxious endeavour, we have at length
succeeded in obtaining, and which we are now seeking
to bring into operation throughout the length and
breadth of the land.
The first step towards obtaining what we want, ever
is to know what we want; and since in this case we
cannot purchase the article ready-made, but have to
fabricate it for ourselves, it is not sufficient to have a
bare name for it, or a vague apprehension about it, but
we must be conversant with its nature, characteristics,
and uses.
Let us further simplify and enlarge the scope of the
question, and ask what is the object of all the education,
public or private, which we give, or seek to give, to our
children ? What, in short, is the purpose of education 1
Using the term education in its broad sense, and
without reference to technical instruction in special
subjects, we can only answer, that its purpose is to
make children into good and capable men and women by
cultivating their intelligence and their moral sense, or
conscience.
It follows, if we agree to this definition, that we are
bound to reject as worse than useless, any instruction
which is calculated to repress or pervert either of those
faculties from their proper healthy development.
Those who at first hesitate to acquiesce in this defini
tion, in the belief that education should have a more
special object, such as to make good Christians, good
Catholics, good Protestants, good Churchmen, or good
Nonconformists, must on a little reflection perceive that
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5
they cannot really mean to rank the intelligence and
moral sense as secondary and subordinate to such ends,
but that they only desire people to be good Christians,
good Churchmen, and so on, because the fact of being so
would, in their view, involve the best culture of the
faculties in question. So that if they believed it did not
involve this end, they would abandon their preference
for such denominations. That is, they would rather
have people to be good men and bad (say) Noncon
formists, than good Nonconformists and bad men.
Agreeing, then, that the object of education is the
development of the intellect and moral sense, we shall,
no doubt, further agree that the best chance of success
fully cultivating those desirable qualities which we
designate virtues, lies in impressing the mind while
young with the most elevated and winning examples of
them, and guarding it from any familiarity with their
opposites ; and that it is because we deem such qualities
to be best, that we regard the Deity as possessing them
in the Infinite, and hold up as a pattern of life the most
perfect example of them in the finite.
Yet, though agreeing both in the object and method
of education when thus plainly put before us, so ingeni
ously perverse and inconsistent are we that we first
refuse to agree upon any common system of instruction
whatever, and then we insist upon neutralising or
vitiating such instruction as we do agree upon, by
mingling it with teaching which is at once repressive of
the Intellect, and injurious to the Moral Sense.
The sole impediment to the success of our efforts, the
rock upon which all our hopes of rescuing the mass of our
countrymen from ignorance and barbarism are in danger
of being dashed, consists in the unreasoning and indis
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criminate veneration in which the Bible is popularlyheld among us. Impelled by that veneration, we hesi
tate not to degrade our children’s view of Deity by
familiarising them with a literature in which He is
represented as feeble, treacherous, implacable, and
unjust; and confound at once their Intelligence and
Moral Sense, by compelling them to regard that litera
ture as altogether divine and infallible.
Strange infatuation and inconsistency, if, after toiling
for years to obtain an effective system of national edu
cation, we either abandon the task as hopeless, or insist
upon accompanying it by teaching which involves a fatal
outrage upon the very intellect and conscience which it
is the express purpose of that education to foster and
develop!
III.
Before' considering the action of the School-boards, I
must advert for a moment to the principle of their constitution.
There is this difference between Government by Re
presentation and Government by Delegation. It is the
‘ duty of the mere delegate to vote on any given question
precisely as a majority of his constituents may instruct
him. The deliberative function rests with them. He is
their faithful, but unintelligent instrument. The repre
sentative, on the contrary, is selected on account of his
superior faculties or attainments, to go on behalf of his
constituents to the headquarters of information, and
there, in conference with other selected intellects, form
the best judgment in his power; his constituents deter
mining only the general principles and direction of his
policy.
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The School-boards which are charged with the deter
mination of our new educational system, having been
selected on this principle of representation, we are
entitled to look to their superior intelligence to sup
plement popular deficiencies ; to be superior to popular
prejudices; to be teachers, and, if need be, rebukers,
rather than followers and flatterers of the less instructed
masses : and it is due to such bodies that we carefully
examine the methods by which they propose to deal with
existing difficulties.
Those difficulties turning exclusively upon Religion,
one great step towards their solution has been gained by
the agreement to exclude from the common schools such
minor subjects of difference as the creeds and catechisms
of particular denominations. The Bible remains, the sole
stumbling-block and rock of offence.
The London Board may be taken as representative
not only of the largest and most intelligent. body of
constituents, but also of all the other School-boards. I
propose, therefore, to deal with the propositions by
which the members of that Board have sought to meet
the “religious difficulty.” They are six in number :
1. That the Bible be excluded altogether, on the
ground that its admission is inconsistent with religious
equality.
2. That the Bible be admitted and read,, but without
note or comment.
3. That the Bible be read for the purpose of religious
culture, at the discretion of the teacher.
4. That the teacher’s discretion in the use of the Bible
be so restricted as to exclude the distinctive doctrines of
any sect.
5. That no principle respecting the use of the Bible
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be laid down, but that each separate school be dealt with
by itself.
6. That the Bible be read with such explanations in
matters of language, history, customs, &c., as may be
needed to make its meaning plain; and that there be
given such instruction in its teaching, on the first prin
ciples of morality and religion, as is suitable to the
capacities of children; always excluding denominational
teaching.
The Fifth Resolution, “ that no principle be laid down,”
aptly describes the condition of the question up to that
point. In the absence of a definition of its object, it
was impossible for the Board to lay down any principle
for its guidance. In the absence of any controlling
definition, it could only look back to its constituents to
see what they would bear from it. And looking to the
confused mass of public opinion and prejudice in the
absence of any light of one’s own, is like shutting one’s
eyes to avoid seeing the dark.
Travelling one day by a railway on which there are
several tunnels, I observed that whenever the train
entered a tunnel, a little boy who sat next to me, im
mediately pressed his hands over his eyes, and buried his
face in the cushions. To my inquiry why he did this,
he answered that it was because he was afraid of the
dark. I asked him whether it was not just as dark to
him when his face was buried in the cushions. He said
yes; but he had not thought of that, and he would not
know now what to do. I could not bear to deprive him
of his faith, however unenlightened, without giving him
another. A lamp was burning in the roof of the car
riage, too dim in the broad daylight to have attracted
his attention, yet bright enough to dispel the gloom of
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the tunnel. I suggested that, instead of covering his
face, he would do better to keep his eyes fixed on the
lamp. The little fellow brightened with joy at the
thought; and during the rest of the journey, the in
stant we entered a tunnel, there he was, no longer fear
ful and burying himself in deeper darkness, but steadfastly
looking to the light that shone above him.
“ Look to the light 1 ” is no bad maxim even for those
who have to determine grave questions for the benefit
of others. We have but to “look to the light” of the
definition we have already agreed upon, and difficulties
fly like darkness before the approaching dawn. Even
the difficulties themselves, like Daphne before the Sun
god, are apt to turn into flowers for our delectation. .
The Sixth Resolution, that proposed by Dr Angus, and
supported by Professor Huxley, is the first that shows
any consciousness that there is a light to which we may
look for encouragement and guidance. “ That instruc
tion should be given in the Bible on the first principles of
morality and religion” According to our definition, Edu
cation consists in the cultivation of the Intelligence and
the Moral Sense. This is the light on which the gaze
must be so steadily fixed, that no conflicting influences
shall be capable of diverting our attention. Interpreted
by it, the Bible itself bears witness to the way in which
it should be used. Here, in full accordance with it, is
one of its utterances, “ God is no respecter of persons;
but in every nation, he that feareth Him and worketh
righteousness, is accepted with Him.” (Acts x. 34-5.)
Acting in this spirit, our School-boards will be no re
specters of authors or books, but in every writing that,
and that only, “ which feareth God and worketh righte
ousness,” shall be accepted by them. Here is another,
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also on the positive side: “ Whatsoever things are true,
whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just,
whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any
virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.”
(Phil. iv. 8.) And another seems to define that Scrip
ture or writing, as alone given by a holy inspiration,
which “ is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for cor
rection, for instruction in righteousness.” (2 Tim. iii. 16.)
And on the negative side we have “ Refuse profane and
old wives’ fables;” (1 Tim. iv. 7.) “not giving heed to
Jewish fables.” (Titus i. 14.) “But all uncleanness let
it not be once named among you ;” “ for it is a shame
even to speak of those things which are done of them in
secret.” (Eph. v. 3, 12.) And one more on the posi
tive side. “ Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of
God.” (1 Cor. x. 31.)
Yet with these plain rules for our guidance, not one
of the resolutions proposes to place any restriction upon
the use of the Bible by the children. One, indeed, pro
poses to exclude it bodily from the schools, the good and
the evil together, but upon grounds in no way connected
with its fitness for the perusal of youth. And even the
resolution finally accepted by the Board, while ambigu
ously proposing “ to give from the Bible such instruction
in the principles of religion and morality as is suitable
to the capacities of children,” ventures on no protest
against the Bible as it now stands being put into the
hands of children at all.
The fact is, that the members have allowed themselves
to be so exclusively guided by the “ winds” of popular
“ doctrine,” that they “ have omitted the weightier mat
ters of the law” of morality, and “ passed over judgment
and the love of God.”
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IV.
The reason is not far to seek. A representative body
would not be representative were any wide interval to
intervene between its own intelligence and attainments
and those of its constituents. The latter can be guided
in their selection only by the light they possess j not by
that which they do not possess. Wherefore, for the
School-board to have passed any more radical Resolution
than that which it did pass, would have been for it to
have made itself, not the representative, but the inde
pendent superior of the body which elected it. The
primary defect, therefore, lies with the people at large.
It is the vast amount of bigoted ignorance and supersti
tion still remaining among us that constitutes the real
obstacle to any sound system of national education. It
is the elders who require to be instructed, before we can
begin to teach the children. It is true that a transition
has begun. But every step of the progress from the old
to the new, from darkness to light, is so vehemently
opposed by the vested interests of the dead past, that
the patience of those who believe in the possibility of
progress may well be exhausted, and their faith quenched
in despair.
To be effectual, therefore, remonstrance must be ad
dressed to the people at large, rather than to their
representatives on the School-boards. The transition of
which I spoke as having already begun, is the transition
from a morality affecting to be based upon theology, to
a religion really based upon morality, and, consequently,
to a sound system of morality. This transition must
attain a far more advanced stage in its progress before
the School-board can even begin to carry out the Re-
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solution it has passed. It is absolutely impossible to
“ give from the Bible, instruction in the principles of
morality and religion suitable to children,” until the
popular theory respecting the Bible, and the theology
based upon it, is so vastly modified as to amount to
an almost total renunciation of that theory. The ab
solute and irreconcilable antagonism between what is
called Biblical Theology and the modern principles of
“ Religion and Morality,” cannot be too distinctly
asserted or loudly proclaimed, if we sincerely desire
our children to have an education really consisting in
the development of their intelligence and moral sense.
Valuing the Bible highly as I do, for very much
that is very valuable in it, it is no grateful task to have
to search out and expose the characteristics which
render it an unsuitable basis for the instruction of
children, whether in morality or in religion. Such ex
posure, however, being indispensable to the solution of
the problem of our national education; to shrink from
it would be to abandon that problem as insoluble, that
education as impossible.
V.
Bearing always in mind our definition of the purpose
and method of education, namely the development of
the intelligence and moral sense by the inculcation of
“ the true, the pure, and the honest,”—bearing in mind
also the fundamental fact in human nature, that man’s
view of Deity inevitably reacts upon himself, tending
to form him in the image of his own ideal,—it is selfevident that to familiarise children with the imperfect
morality, the coarse manners and expressions, the rude
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fables, and the degrading ideas of Deity, appertaining to
a people low in culture—such as were the Israelites—
and to confound their minds and consciences at the most
impressible period of life by telling them that such
narratives and representations are all divinely inspired
and infallibly true,—is to utterly stultify ourselves and
the whole of the principles by which we profess to be
actuated in giving them an education at all. Did we
find any others than ourselves, say South Sea savages,
putting into the hands of their children, books containing
coarse and impure stories, detailing the morbid anatomy
of the most execrable vices, extollipg deeds prompted by
a spirit of the lowest selfishness, exulting in fraud,
rapine, and murder, and justifying whatever is most
disgraceful to humanity by representing it as prompted
or approved by their Deity, and so making Him alto
gether such an one as themselves,—surely we should say
that they must indeed be savages of the lowest and most
degraded type, and sad proofs of the utter depravity of
human nature.
In investigating from our present point of view the
contents of this most read, yet most misread, of books,
we must dismiss from our minds any idea that its most
objectionable features are amenable to revision or re
translation. The faults thus removable are but as
freckles upon the skin compared with a constitutional
taint. For it is the spirit as well as the letter of a large
portion of it, that whether “ for reproof, for correction,
or for instruction in righteousness,” is hopelessly in
fault: and the spirit of a book is of infinitely greater
importance than its superficial details.
Palpable to the eyes of all are the hideous tales of Lot
and his daughters; (Gen. xix.) Judah and Tamar;
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(xxxvii.) the massacre of the Shechemites; (xxxiv.)
the Levite of Ephraim; (Jud. xix.) David and Bathsheba;
(2 Sam. ix.) Amnon and his sister ; (xiii.) and whole
chapters in Leviticus and the Prophets. That such
things should be in a book given freely to children to
read, and that they should be expected notwithstanding
to grow up pure and uncontaminated in mind and habit,
is one of those anomalies in the British character which
makes it a hopeless puzzle to the world. Who can say
that much of the viciousness at present prevalent among
us, is not attributable to early curiosity being aroused
and stimulated by the obscenities of the Old Testament ?
To put the Bible as it is into the hands of our children,
is not only totally to bewilder their sense of right and
wrong,—it is to invite familiarity with the idea of the
worst Oriental vices.
Even in the case of those vices being mentioned only
to be denounced, the suggestion is apt to remain, and
the denunciation to be disregarded. It notoriously is
injudicious to put into the minds of children faults of
which they might never have thought themselves, for
the sake of admonishing them against them. It is
related somewhere that a catalogue of offences punish
able by law was once posted in the Roman forum as a
warning to the citizens; but that this was followed by
such a vast increase in the number and variety of the
crimes committed, that it was found advisable to remove
it. I myself know an instance of a pious mother sending
her daughter to a boarding-school, having first written
in her Bible a list of the chapters and passages which she
was not to read. It is remarkable how popular in the
school that particular Bible became. The other girls
were always borrowing it. There is no reason to suppose
that boys would have acted differently.
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It is true that the particular instances I have adduced
may not he immoral as they stand in the Bible, but they
are assuredly provocative of immorality in children who
read them. A far more serious indictment against the
Bible as a handbook of moral instruction must be founded
on its habit of representing the Deity as a consenting
party to some of the worst actions of its characters :
nay, so unreliable is it as a basis of anything what
ever, that after thus characterising the Deity, it deals in
strong denunciations against those “ who not only com
mit such things themselves, but have pleasure in them
that do them
(Rom. i. 32.) thus, by direct implication
condemning the Deity Himself. If it be desirable to
impress upon children the belief that only those “ who
fear God and work righteousness are acceptable to him,”
it is to stultify the whole principle of their education to
represent Him to them as an eastern monarch, selecting
his favourites by caprice, and independently of any merit
or demerit on their part. Yet the entire Bible rests
upon the idea that so far from being an equal Father of
all, “ whose tender mercies are over all His works,”
(Ps. cxlv. 9.) the Almighty selected out of all mankind
one race to be “ His own peculiar people,” (Deut. xiv. 9.)
and out of that race certain individuals to be His own
peculiar favourites, and this in spite of the most glaring
defects in their characters and conduct; and sustained
those whom He had thus chosen through the whole
course of their misdeeds.
Thus, Abraham is said to have had “ faith,” and this
faith is said to have been “ imputed to him for righteous
ness (Rom. iv. 22.) but how far was his actual conduct
righteous, and how much faith did it imply 1 Assured
by repeated promises of the divine favour and protection,
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as well as of a great posterity through his then childless
wife Sarai, he twice voluntarily prostituted her to Pagan
chieftains, pretending that she was only his sister. And
we read that “the Lord plagued,”—not the liar and
poltroon who thus degraded his wife, and entrapped the
kings, whose hospitality he was enjoying;—not the wife
so extraordinarily ready to “ obey her husband in all
things(it appears that her age was about sixty-five on
one occasion, and ninety on the other);—but “ the Lord
plagued Pharaoh and Abimelech with great plagues be
cause of Sarai, Abraham’s wife,” and in the case of the
latter, would only grant forgiveness upon the intercession
of Abraham, saying, “ for he is a prophet.” (Gen. xii. 20.)
Isaac, we read, copied the twice committed fault of his
father, in passing off his wife Rebekah as his sister upon
another king, and was divinely blessed notwithstanding.
In short, in all three transactions, out of the whole of the
parties to them, Abraham, Isaac, Sarai, Rebekah, .the
three kings, and the Deity, those only who indicate the
possession of any moral sense whatever are the Pagan
kings, who show it in no small degree, and these alone
are punished; while Abraham and Isaac retain the divine
favour throughout, the former being honoured by the
distinctive title of “ Friend of God.” (James ii. 23.)
The selfishness and cowardice of Abraham are still
farther illustrated by his treatment of Hagar and Ish
mael. There is no reason to doubt the perfect truthful
ness of the Bible narrative in respect to him. But when
it goes on to represent the Deity as encouraging him in
his cruel and unfatherly conduct to his son, and bid
ding him follow the lead of a frivolous and heartless
wife;—“ In all that Sarai hath said unto thee, hearken
unto her voice(Gen. xxi. 12.) then our m'oral sense is
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offended, and we refuse to identify the God of Abraham
with the God of our own clearer perceptions.
The utter indifference of “ the God of Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob” to any moral law whatever, reaches its climax
in the history of Jacob. A liar and a trickster from
early youth, yet constantly enjoying the presence and
approbation of God, who finds no word or sign of re
proach wherewith to touch his conscience or arouse his
fears,—such is the patriarch whom the Bible sets forth
as one of God’s especial favourites, because, forsooth, he
had “ faith.” In presence of this mystic quality, right
and wrong sink into absolute nothingness; and that
most fatal of all impieties, a total divorce between the
.will of God and the moral law, finds its plea and justi
fication. It is little that I would give for the moral
sensibility of the child who could read without a pang of
indignation and a tear of pity the tale of this ingrained
blackleg’s atrocities ; his taking advantage of his rough,
honest-hearted brother’s extremity of exhaustion through
hunger to extort from him his birthright; (Gen.
xxv.) his heartless deception of his poor, blind old
father; (xxvii.) his repeated cheats, thefts, and false
hoods against his father-in-law; (xxx., &c.) and the
divine confirmation to him of the blessings thus fraudu
lently acquired ; “ yea, and he shall be blessed,” and con
stant assurance of the divine presence and approbation.
It is without a word of repudiation that the Bible ac
quiesces in Jacob’s degradation of the Deity to a huck
stering or bargaining God; a God, too, who can be got
the better of in a business transaction. For, “Jacob
vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me in this
way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and raiment
to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in
B
■
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peace; then shall the Lord be my God; and this stone
which I have set for a pillar shall be God’s house; and
of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth
unto thee.” (xxviii. 20, &c.)
When the Israelites reach the Promised Land, their
“ sacred history” consists of little beside perpetual but
cheries. The more directly they are represented as being
under divine guidance, the more sanguinary is their
career. Slaughter of men, women, children, infants at
the breast. None spared, none, except, sometimes—
and mark the exception made by the followers, not of
Mahomet, but of Jehovah—the unmarried girls. Every
sentiment of humanity and mercy is accounted an un
pardonable weakness. Jehovah appears as a savage
patriot-God, approving impurity, treachery, murder, and
whatever else was perpetrated on the side of his “ chosen
people.” A Bushman of South Africa being once asked
to define the difference between good and evil, replied,
“ It is good when I steal another man’s wives; evil when
another man steals mine.” Such is precisely the standard
of right and wrong laid down by the Bible in respect to
the Israelites and their neighbours. Can we wonder that
recent moralists have written to vindicate the Almighty
from the aspersions cast upon his character in the Bible.*
In all the events of the late dreadful war upon the
Continent, probably no single incident caused such a
thrill of horror as that of the wounded German soldier
who staggered from the field of battle into a peasant’s
cottage, and fell fainting upon the bed, and only lived
long enough to tell his comrades how that the woman of
the cottage had taken advantage of his helpless condition
to pick out his eyes with a fork. Possibly the French
* E.g. Theodore Parker in America, and Dr Perfitt in England.
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woman had heard of the blessing pronounced upon Jael
for a similar act. Possibly she had learned from “ Sacred
History” that the most revolting perfidy and cruelty be
come heroic virtues when exercised upon one’s own side.
And were not we Europeans of to-day, with all our faults,
infinitely in advance of those bad times, we too might
find a patriot-poet rivalling the utterances of the
“divinely-inspired” Deborah, to laud the French tigress
as the Jewish one was lauded, detail with rapturous
glee every particular of the fiendish deed, and mock the
wretched victim’s mother watching and longing in vain
for her murdered son’s return.
Nay, the conduct of her whom the Bible pronounces
as “ blessed above women,” was even more flagrant in
its utter heinousness than that of the French woman.
For the husband of Jael had severed himself from the
hostile peoples; “there was peace between Jabin, the
King of Hazor, and the house of Heber, the Keliite
and he dwelt, a friendly neutral, in a region apart. The
general Sisera, moreover, utterly beaten and discomfited,
had fled expressly to Jael’s tent for safety, knowing the
family to be friendly, and she had invited him in with
assurances of protection. “ Turn in, my lord, fear not.”
(Jud. iv.)
While Abraham is described as “ the friend of God,”
to David is awarded the honour of being styled “ a man
after God’s own heart; ” (1 Sam. xiii. 14; Acts xiii. 22.)
“who turned not away from anything that he com
manded him all the days of his life, save only ” in one
particular instance. (1 Kings xv. 5.) In order to see how
little the Bible is fitted for the instruction of children in
respect of a moral sense, let us brush aside for a moment
the halo with which the name of David is surrounded,
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and read his history for ourselves. It is through want
of doing this, that a popular writer has recently described
his life as uniformly “bright and beautiful up to the
time of his one great sin.”* Yet, his career, soon after
the intrepid act which first brought him into notice, was
one of rebellion and brigandage. Collecting all that were
in debt, distress, and discontent, (1 Sam. xxii. 2.) he or
ganised them into bands of freebooters to levy blackmail
upon the farmers. One of these, named Nabal, when
applied to on account of David, boldly and naturally
answered, “ Who is David ? and who is this son of Jesse?
there be many servants now-a-days that break away
every man from his master. Shall I then take my
bread, and my water, and my flesh that I have killed
for my shearers, and give it unto men whom I know not
whence they be ?”
However, Abigail, the wife of Nabal, touched by her
servant’s account of the gallantry of the band, took of
her husband’s stores and gave liberally to them. Upon
this David assured her that, but for her conduct, he
would not have left even a dog of Nahal’s household
alive by next morning. A few days afterwards Nabal
died; the Bible, as if to remove any suspicion of foul
play, stating that “ the Lord smote him;” when David im
mediately took Abigail to be his own wife. (1 Sam. xxv.)
When the great contest took place between the Philis
tines and the Israelites, in which the latter were utterly
routed, and Saul and Jonathan, David’s bosom friend,
were slain, David with his forces stood aloof, unheeding
the peril of his countrymen. (1 Sam. xxx.) The crown
thus devolved upon Ishbosheth the son of Saul, who was
supported by eleven out of the twelve tribes. David,
* Miss Yonge, in “ Musings on the Christian Year.”
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however, would not accept their choice, even though the
whole strength of Israel was needed at that critical mo
ment to withstand the Philistines. (2 Sam. ii.) Exciting
a civil war, he got himself acknowledged as king by the
dissentient tribe of Judah. Treachery and murder came
freely to his aid, and he at length found the crown of
Israel in his hands. But he felt his tenure of it insecure
so long as any descendant of Saul remained to dispute it
with him. He therefore concerted with the priests, who,
since Saul had slighted their authority, had sided with
David, a plot to get rid of the seven sons and grandsons
of Saul. The country having been for three years dis
tressed by famine, David consulted the Oracles. In
Bible phraseology, he “ inquired of the Lord.” Of what
kind of a Lord he inquired, may be judged by the re
sponse. “ It is for Saul and his bloody house, because
he slew the Gibeonites ” many years before. Upon this
the Gibeonites, duly instructed, besought of David that,
as an “ atonement,” seven males of Saul’s family should
be 11 hanged up unto the Lord.” And David took the
seven and delivered them into the hands of the Gibe
onites, five of them being sons of his own former wife
Michal, “ and they hanged them in the hill before the
Lord. . . . And after that, God was intreated for the
land.” (2 Sam. xxi. 1-14.) Revolt, treason, murder,
human sacrifices, all in the name of “ the Lord ” !
On one occasion, after defeating the Moabites, David,
we read, assembled all the people of that nation on a
plain, made them lie down, and divided them into three
groups with a line. Two of these groups he put to death,
and the other he reduced to slavery. (2 Sam. viii. 2.) The
conquered Ammonites he treated with even greater fero
city, tearing and hewing some of them in pieces with
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harrows, axes, and saws, and roasting others in brick
kilns. (xii. 31.) His luxury and voluptuousness equalled
his cruelty. Having had seven wives while he ruled
over Judah alone, he added to the number all those who
had belonged to Saul, (8.) and took yet more wives and
concubines after he had come from Hebron, (v. 13.) But
these, and his vast pomp, were insufficient to satiate him.
Having caught sight of Bathsheba, the wife of one of his
captains named Uriah, he took her to himself, and sent
Uriah to join the army in the field, giving express orders
to his commanding officer to place him in the fore front
of the fight to insure his being killed.
It appears that there was then in Israel an honest pro
phet named Nathan, who had the courage to remonstrate
with the king, and who did so with such effect, that
David was made, for once, to see the enormity of his
conduct. We read, however, that the Lord put away
David’s sin, so that he did not die. But his child did.
And no sooner was the innocent thus punished for the
guilty, than “ David comforted Bathsheba his wife, and
she bare a son, and he called his name Solomon; and
the Lord loved him. And he sent by the hand of
Nathan the prophet,” now subsided into the obsequious
court chaplain, “and he called his name Jedidiah,” or
“ Beloved of the Lord.” (2 Sam. xii.)
Old age and infirmity wrought no amendment in the
truculent spirit of David ; a spirit so truculent as to make
it morally impossible that he could really have been the
author of any of those psalms which in after ages it
pleased his countrymen to ascribe to him; excepting
only, perhaps, the more ferocious of them. He has been
called, “ the Byron of the Bible,” which, after what has
just been stated, seems exceedingly unfair to Byron.
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Early in David’s career of blood, one Shimei had, in
generous indignation, cursed him for his murder of the
sons of Saul. (2 Sam. xvi.) He had afterwards begged
forgiveness and received it. (xix. 16-23.) Yet David’s
last instructions to Solomon were in this wise—“ Behold
thou hast with thee Shimei the son of Gera, which cursed
me with a grievous curse in the day when I came to
Mahanaim: but he came down to meet me at Jordan,
and I sware to him by the Lord, saying, I will not put
thee to death with the sword. Now, therefore, hold
him not guiltless . . . but his hoar head bring thou
down to the grave with blood. So David slept with his
fathers.” (1 Kings ii. 8-10, &c.) And Solomon “com
manded Benaiah, the son of Jehoiada, which went out and
fell upon Shimei, that he died.” (46.) “ And Solomon
loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of David, his
father.” And “ the Lord appeared to Solomon in a
dream by night; and God said, ask what I shall give
thee. And Solomon said, Thou hast shown unto thy
servant David, my father, great mercy, according as he
walked before thee in truth, and in righteousness, and in
uprightness of heart with thee : and thou hast kept for
him this great kindness, that thou hast given him a son
to sit on his throne. . . . And God said unto him . . .
if thou wilt walk in my ways, to keep my statutes and
my commandments, as thy father David did walk, then
will I lengthen thy days.” (1 Kings iii.)
The mystery of these astounding utterances is not far
to seek. History in those days was the work of the
sacerdotal class. To support and subserve that class was
then, as it has been, for the most part, ever since, to be
pronounced, “ beloved of the Lord,” no matter how evil
the individual really was, or how derogatory to the di
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vine honour it might be to have such a preference ascribed
to it. To have “ faith ” in the priests counterbalanced
and condoned any quantity of wicked “ works.” Their
standard of right and wrong, good and evil, was that of
the Bushman. Whatever was for them was good ; what
ever was against them was evil. It is, then, for us seri
ously to ask ourselves whether, when we set before our
children as a fit object of worship such a being as the
Bible represents the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
of Samuel, David, and Solomon, to have been, we are
ministering towards the end we have in view in giving
to them an education; or whether, in place of raising
them in the scale of being, we are not rather ministering
to the total degradation in them of the human soul.
VI.
1 .
These are but a few of the instances in which the
Bible is antagonistic to one of the main objects of educa
tion, the development of the moral sense. We will now
examine how far its teaching is adapted to promote the
cultivation of the intellect, still confining ourselves to
the Old Testament.
What are the “ glorious gains ” of the modern mind,
of which we are justly proud, and what are the ideas re
specting the constitution of the universe, the recognition
of which we regard as necessary to entitle any one to
the appellation of an intelligent and educated person 1
Surely they are that the order of nature is invariable,
the whole universe being governed by laws so perfectly
appointed as to need no rectification, and fixed so inher
ently in it as to constitute its nature. That, though in
capable of interference from without, inasmuch as there
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can be no without, all things proceeding from within
from its divine immanent character,—its parts are en
dowed with a capacity of advancing by a process of con
tinual evolution to a degree ever higher of complexity
and organisation, as within the physical structure rises
the mental, with all its capabilities of moral, intellectual,
and spiritual, in grandeur surpassing the majesty of the
whole external Cosmos. That it is a low and degrading
superstition to regard deity as other than One, ever liv
ing and operating equally and impartially throughout the
whole domain of existence; or as dwelling apart from
the world, and only occasionally giving proof of his being
by disturbance of the general order. And that,—while it
is impossible truly to ascribe to him aught of feeling cor
responding to the love, hate, fear, passion, caprice, appe
tite, or other affection of men,—when for purposes of
instruction or devotion we seek to utilise the anthropo
morphic tendency of our nature, He is to be represented
as the absolute impersonation of all that we recognise as
best in Humanity.
To what depths do we fall when, abandoning these
hard-won gains of the Intellect’s long warfare against
ignorance, barbarism, and superstition, instead of placing
our children upon the vantage ground we have acquired,
and handing to them our lights at the point which we
ourselves have attained, that they may carry them on
yet further, we abuse their understandings at the most
impressible age, by compelling them to regard the
Almighty as no equal God and Father of the whole
human race, but the exclusive patron of a small Semitic
tribe dwelling in Palestine, whom he supported by
prodigies and miracles in their aggressions upon their
neighbours, revealing to them alone the light of his
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word, and condemning all others to enforced darkness.
By teaching them to believe in magic and witchcraft,
in talismans, charms, and vows; in beasts speaking
with human voices and sentiments; (Gen. iii. 1-4;
Num. xxii. 28-30.) in a deity writing with a finger; (Ex.
xxxi. 18.) speaking with a voice; (xix. 19.) enjoying
the smell of roast meat; (Gen. viii. 21.) standing face to
face ; (xxxii. 30.) walking in a garden ; (iii. 8.) revealing
his hinder parts; (Ex. xxxiii. 23.) coming down to obtain
information as to what men were doing, and to devise
measures in accordance therewith; (Gen. xi. 5-7 ; xviii.
20, 21.) impressing men, not through their consciences,
but by signs and wonders, miracles and dreams; recog
nising and confirming advantages gained by fraud, to the
irreparable disadvantage of their rightful owner; (Gen.
xxvii. 33-37.) in the case of one deliverer of his chosen
people, making his strength depend upon the length of
his hair; (Jud. xvi. 17.) allowing another, in virtue of
a hasty vow, to offer up his daughter in human sacrifice
as a burnt-offering; (xi. 30-39 ; Num. xxx.) and, lastly,
teaching them to believe in man created perfect, and
yet unable to resist the first and smallest temptation;
and, for such a peccadillo as the eating of the fruit of a
magical tree, being with his whole unborn progeny so
ferociously damned as to be redeemable only by another
human sacrifice, even the stupendous sacrifice of God’s
only Son.
How utterly bewildering to the expanding intelligence
of youth to be told that the God whom they are to
worship is revealed in the Bible, and to find him such a
being as this ! Terrible indeed is their responsibility
who proclaim as divinely infallible every absurd or
monstrous narrative to be found in the fragmentary
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legends of a barbarous and imaginative people. When
we consider how great is the difficulty of detaching the
mind from pernicious ideas when imprinted on it in
childhood, and fitting it to receive the later revelations
of reason and morality, we can but shudder at the sum
of misery undergone in the conflict between the Intellect
and the Conscience, through the former having com
menced its onward march, while the latter still continues
bound to the beliefs of childhood. A very Nessus-shirt
of burning poison and agony to all generations of
Christendom, has been the garb of ancient faith which we
have adopted and worn, in spite of its being totally
unfitted to us.
VII.
It is a practice with many savage tribes to invest some
object with certain magical properties, altogether inde
pendent of its real qualities, and to worship this with a
blind adoration, the whole process being known by the
name of Fetich-worship.
Now what else than precisely such Fetich-worship is
theirs who would put up a book to be venerated, but
refuse to allow it to be made comprehensible by any
kind of interpretation ? Yet, of all the Resolutions
considered by the School-board, that for which the
country at largS manifested the strongest preference at
the elections was the proposition “that the Bible be
read in the schools, but without note or comment.”
It can only be the absence of any precise notion as to
what education consists in that has prompted a sugges
tion so utterly opposed to any sort of wholesome de
velopment. To suggest difficulties—such difficulties—
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and forbid their explanation ! Better far that the
children read the Bible in the original tongues at once,
than in the “ authorised version.” They might not get
much good from the process, but they would assuredly
get less harm.
But we will test the working of this suggestion by a
few out of the numerous instances of apparent contra
diction which, “ without note or comment,” cannot fail
to plunge youthful readers in hopeless perplexity.
And first, concerning the Deity, we read that “ God
saw everything that he had made, and behold it was
very good.” (Gen. i. 31.) This was said after the
creation of man, when the character and liabilities of
that creation must have been fully known to God.
Yet we are told soon after that “ it repented the Lord
that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him
at his heart; (iv. 6.) implying that he was surprised and
disappointed at the way man had turned out, having
expected better things of him : implying, too, that the
divine prescience was at fault, the divine work a failure.
And in many other passages we read of the Deity as
repenting and changing his mind; being weary and
resting. Yet elsewhere in the same book it is declared
that “ God is not a man that he should repent;” (Num.
xxxiii. 19.) being one “with whom is no variable
ness, neither shadow of turning;” (Jam. i. 17.) “who
fainteth not, neither is weary.” (Is. xl. 28 ; also 1 Sam.
xv, 35 ; Jonah iii. 10 ; Ex. xxxiii. 1 ; &c.)
Even the all-important questions of God’s justice and
power remain in suspense with such passages as these
unreconciled : “ A God of truth and without iniquity,
just and right is he.” (Deut. xxxii. 4.) “ Hear now, 0
house of Israel; are not my ways equal ? are not your
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ways unequal ? Therefore I will judge you.............
every one according to his ways, saith the Lord God.”
“ The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father.”
(Ez. xviii. 20, 25-30.) And, “ I . . . . am a jealous
God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the
children.” (Ex. xx. 5.) Also, “For the children being
not yet bom, neither having done any good or evil, that
the purpose of God according to election might stand,
not of works, but of him that calleth, it was said unto
her (by God), the elder shall serve the younger. As it
is written, Jacob have I loved (Jacob !) but Esau have I
hated.” (Eom. ix. 11-13 ; Gen. ix. 25 ; Matt. xiii. 11-17.)
How, moreover, are children to reconcile this with the
declaration that “God is no respecter of persons?”
And while, notwithstanding that “ with God all things
are possible,” (Matt. xix. 25.) we are told that “ the
Lord was with Judah, and he drave out the inhabitants
of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabi
tants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron.”
(Jud. i. 19 ; Josh. xvii. 18.) Also that the inhabitants
of Meroz were bitterly cursed “because they came not
to the help of the Lord against the mighty.” (Jud. v. 23.)
Notwithstanding that we read in several places that
God was seen face to face, and his voice heard, (Gen. iii.
9, 10 ; xxxii. 30; Ex. xxiv. 9-11; xxxiii. 11 ; Is. vi. 1.)
we are yet assured that “ no man hath seen God at any
time; ” (John i. 18.) hath “ neither heard his voice at any
time, nor seen his face.” (v. 37.) And God himself said
unto Moses, “ Thou canst not see my face; for there shall
no man see me and live.” (Ex. xxiii. 20.) And Paul
speaks of him as one “ whom no man hath seen, nor can
see.” (1 Tim. vi. 16.)
It is little that children will learn from the Bible con
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cerning the origin of evil, when, against “ I make peace
and create evil. I the Lord do all these things;” (Is.
xiv. 7.) “ out of the mouth of the Most High proceedeth not evil and good ?” (Lam. iii. 38.)—they set, “ with
out note or comment,” “ God is not the author of con
fusion;” (1 Cor. xiv. 33.) “a God of truth, and without
iniquity, just and right is he.” (Deut. xxxii. 4.) “God
cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any
man.” (Jas. i. 13.)
Concerning the divine dwelling-place, we read that
“ the Lord appeared to Solomon, and said ... I have
chosen and sanctified this house . . . and mine eyes and
heart shall be there perpetually.” (2 Chron. vii. 12-16.)
Yet we also read, “ Howbeit the Most High dwelleth not
in temples made with hands.” (Acts vii. 48.) In one
place he is described as “ dwelling in light which no man
can approach;” (1 Tim. iv. 16.) and in another it is
said, “ clouds and darkness are round about him.” (Ps.
xcvii. 2.)
Similarly contrast these also: “ The Lord is a man of
war(Ex. xv. 3.) “ The Lord mighty in battle(Ps.
xxiv. 8.) “ The Lord of hosts is his name.” (Is. li. 15.)
And, “God is not the author of confusion, but of peace.” (1
Cor. xiv. 33.) “ Bloody men shall not live out half their
days.” (Ps. lv. 23.) “ The God of peace be with you all.”
(Rom. xv. 33.)
In reference to the making and worshipping of images,
we have the positive command, “ Thou shalt not make
unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything
that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath. Thou
shalt not bow down to them, nor serve (or worship)
them,” (Ex. xxii. 4.) and many repeated denunciations
of idolatry. Yet Moses was commanded to “ make two
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cherubim of gold.” (xxv. 18.) Also, “ the Lord said
unto Moses, make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a
pole, and it shall come to pass that every one that is
bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.” (Num. xxi. 8.)
A direct act of idolatry commanded by God himself!
The books of Exodus and Leviticus abound in direc
tions instituting and regulating sacrifice, in terms such
as “ Thou shalt offer every day a bullock for a sin-offering
for atonement;” (Ex. xxix. 36; also xviii.; Lev. i. 9;
xxiii. 27, &c.) and the most complex and gorgeous
system of ceremonial worship was based upon it, ex
pressly by divine command. Yet in the Psalms we find
the Almighty exclaiming, “ Will I eat the flesh of bulls,
or drink the blood of goats? Offer unto God thanks
giving, and pay thy vows unto the Most High.” (Ps. 1.
13, 14.) And in Isaiah, “To what purpose is the mul
titude of your sacrifices unto me ? saith the Lord . . .
I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of
he-goats . . . When ye come to appear before me, who
hath required this at your hand ? Bring no more vain
oblations; incense is an abomination unto me; the new
moons and Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot
away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.”
(Is. i. 11-13.) And Jeremiah represents the Almighty
as positively repudiating any connection with the Levitical code. “ I spake not unto your fathers, nor com
manded them in the day that I brought them out of the
land of Egypt, concerning burnt-offerings or sacrifices.”
(Gen. vii. 22.)
“ Without note or comment,” children would assuredly
fail to comprehend the significance of the antagonism
necessarily existing between the whole sacerdotal
class, with its “ trivial round” of ritual and observance,
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and immoral doctrine of compensation for moral de
ficiencies by material payments, and the honest, out
spoken prophet or teacher of practical religion. And to
fail to comprehend this, is to fail to learn one of the
most valuable lessons to be derived from the Bible.
Even the horrible practice of human sacrifice finds
justification with the sacerdotal followers of the Jewish
divinity. We have already seen how, backed by the
priests, David delivered up the seven sons and grandsons
of Saul, “ and they hanged them in the hill before the
Lord . . . and after that God was entreated for the
land.” (2 Sam. xxi.) Moreover, “God said unto Abra
ham, take now thy son, thine only son Isaac . . . and
offer him fora burnt-offering.” (Gen. xxii. 2.) Jephthah,
too, “ vowed a vow unto the Lord” that he would “ offer
up for a burnt-offering” whatever he met first on his re
turn home, provided the Lord would give him a victory.
The victory was given, and the bargain was kept; “ the
Lord,” of course, being in his omniprescience, well aware
what it involved; and, to judge by his antecedent and
subsequent conduct, by no means incapable of being in
duced thereto by the magnitude of the bribe. Jephthah’s
own daughter was the first to come to congratulate her
father j “ and he did with her according to his vow.”
(Jud. xi.) The sacerdotal law gave him no choice, for it
positively enacted that vows, however iniquitous, were
not to be broken, except when taken under certain cir
cumstances by a maid, a wife, or a widow. (Num. xxx.)
The liberality and mercifulness of God find expression
in many touching declarations in the Scriptures. We
read that “ every one that asketh, receiveth, and he that
seeketh, findeth.” (Matt. vii. 8.) “ Those that seek me
early shall find me.” (Prov. viii. 17.) Yet on the other
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side we have, “ Then shall they call upon me, but I will
not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not
find me.” (i. 28.) And notwithstanding such assertions
as: “The Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.” (James
v. 11.) “He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the
children of men.” (Lam. iii. 33.) “ The Lord is good to
all, and his tender mercies are over all his works.” (Ps.
cxlv. 9.) “I have no pleasure in the death of him that
dieth, saith the Lord God.” (Ezek. xviii. 32.) “ God is
love;” (1 John iv. 16.) “Who will have all men to be
saved;” (1 Tim. ii. 4.) “For his mercy endureth for
ever;” (1 Chron. xvi. 34, &c.)—we find also the following
ferocious utterances : “ The Lord thy God is a consuming
fire.” (Deut. iv. 34.) “ I will dash them one against
another, even the fathers and the sons together, saith the
the Lord. I will not pity, nor spare, nor have mercy,
but destroy them.” (Jer. xiii. 14.) “And thou shalt
consume all the people which the Lord thy God shall
deliver thee: thine eye shall have no pity upon them.”
(Deut. vii. 16, and 2.) “ Thus saith the Lord of hosts , . .
slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and
sheep, camel and ass.” (1 Sam. xv. 2, 3.) “ Because they
had looked into the ark of the Lord, even he smote of
the people fifty thousand and threescore and ten men.
And the people lamented because the Lord had smitten
many of the people with great slaughter.” (1 Sam. vi. 19.)
" I also will deal in fury; mine eye shall not spare,
neither will I have pity. And though they cry in mine
ears with a loud voice, yet will I not hear them.” (Ezek.
viii. 18.) “And the Lord said, Go through the city and
smite; let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity: slay
utterly old and young, both maids and little children,
and women. . . . and begin at my sanctuary.” (ix. 4-6.)
c
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It is no less impossible to derive from the Bible alone
any- certainty of God’s unfailing truthfulness than of his
mercy. It is true that we are told, “It is impossible for
God to lie.” (Heb. vi. 18.) “ Lying lips are an abomina
tion to the Lord.” (Prov. xii. 22.) “‘Thou shalt not
bear false witness against thy neighbour.” (Ex. xx. 16.)
“ These things doth the Lord hate ... a lying tongue
. . . a false witness that speaketh lies.” (Prov. iv. 17-19.)
And, “ all liars shall have their part in the lake which
burneth with fire and brimstone.” (Rev. xxi. 8.) Yet,
on the other hand, we find the lies of the Israelitish
women in Egypt, and of Rahab in Jericho, justified;—
“ that admirable falsehood,” as St. Chrysostom called
the latter. (Ex. i. 18-20; Josh. ii. 4-6.) We find the
atrocious deceit of Jael more than justified. (Jud. iv. v.)
And we have also this astounding revelation from behind
the scenes in heaven :—“ And the Lord said, who shall
persuade Ahab 1 . . . And there came forth a spirit and
stood before the Lord, and said, I will persuade him.
And the Lord said, wherewith 1 And he said, I will go
forth and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy
prophets. And he said, thou shalt persuade him, and
prevail also; go forth and do so. Now, therefore, be
hold the Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all
these thy prophets, and the Lord hath spoken evil con
cerning thee.” (1 Kings xxii. 21-23.) And in confirma
tion of this otherwise incredible narrative, we read later,
“ If the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a
thing, I the Lord have deceived that prophet, and I will
stretch out mine hand upon him, and will destroy him
from the midst of my people.” (Ezek. xiv. 9.) The New
Testament adopts a similar view of God’s dealings; for,
mingled with its “ glad tidings of salvation,” we read,—
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“ God shall send them strong delusion, that they should
believe a lie, that they all might be damned.” (2 Thess.
ii. 11, 12.)
Once more it must be asked, Can we wonder that
earnest and pious men of our own times have, in their
zeal for the honour of God, endeavoured to rescue his
character from the treatment it receives in the Scriptures ?
VIII.
The character of Jesus is as variously drawn in the
New Testament as that of the Deity in the Old; and
those who desire the children in our schools to recognise
in him the perfect man and infallible Teacher, should, to
be consistent, be the very last to wish them to read the
New Testament “ without note or comment.” Too often
it happens that the explanatory lessons with which the
Scriptures are accompanied, are utterly pernicious, and
even blasphemous. This very year, a youth who has
been for some years a student in one of the wealthiest of
our public foundation-schools, was required to give some
instances of human feeling on the part of Jesus. Of
the value, whether intellectually or religiously, of the
education given at that school, we may judge by
his answer. Of the tender sympathy shown by Jesus
towards all who were suffering : of his unselfish devotion
to the cause of the poor and the depraved; of his noble
indignation against injustice and oppression; of his in
tense sense of a personal Father in God, and instinctive
detestation of all sacerdotal interference;—of all these so
eminently human characteristics, our scholar said nothing.
The result of his compulsory attendance at the school
chapel every morning, and at two full services every
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Sunday, beside much other Scripture instruction, was to
impress upon him the belief that whatever is human is
bad, and whatever is bad is human. He concluded,
therefore, that by human feeling on the part of Jesus,
an instance of something bad was intended. And he
actually sent up for answer, as a solitary instance of
human feeling on the part of Jesus, the story of his losing
his temper, and cursing a fig-tree for being barren when
it was not the season for figs 1 (Mark xi. 13, 14, 21.)
As any explanations which accompany the reading of
the Old Testament should be contrived to disabuse chil
dren of the notion that the Deity could ever have been
such a being as is there described, so in reading of Jesus
in the New Testament they should be told that there are
indications of a better man than the Gospels make him,
peeping out through the corrupted text. “ It is impos
sible that such love and devotion as followed him through
out his life could ever have been won by a hard, unjust,
or intolerant character.” Yet he is represented as more
than once addressing his admirable and devoted mother
in a rough, unfilial tone; (John ii. 4; Luke ii. 4.) and
launching most uncalled for reproaches at a gentleman of
whose hospitality he was partaking, on the occasion of a
woman coming in and washing his feet with her tears,
and wiping them with her hair. (Luke vii. 32-50.)
Nor can there be any doubt as to what must be their
natural judgment of the spirit of one who could describe
his own mission in these terms : “ Whosoever shall con
fess me before men, him will I also confess before my
Father which is in heaven. But whosoever will deny
me before men, him will I also deny before my Father
which is in heaven. Think not that I am come to
send peace on earth: I come not to send peace, but a
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sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against
his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the
daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, and a man’s
foes shall be they of his own household.” (Matt. x. 32-36.)
Hardly will they reconcile this with the promise of his
birth-song, “On earth peace, good-will toward men;”
(Luke ii. 14.) but will hastily conclude that the angels
were sadly misinformed. And when they read that one
who is elsewhere described as “ going about teaching and
healing” among a people who were “ perishing for lack
of knowledge,” uttered to his disciples such words as
these, “ Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of
the kingdom of God : but unto others in parables ; that
seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not
understand;” (Luke viii. 8.) and read further, “ Therefore
they could not believe, because he hath blinded their eyes
and hardened their heart; that they should not see with
their eyes, nor understand with their heart, and be con
verted, and I should heal them; ” (John xii. 39, 40.)—and
from these fearful utterances, turn to the declaration, that
this same Jesus had received “ all power in heaven and
earth;” (Matt, xxviii. 18.) and that he “ came not to judge
but to save the world;” (John xii. 27.) came especially
“ to seek and to save that which was lost;” (Luke xix. 10.)
it will be no wonder if their souls finally succumb to
despair, and they cry to their teachers, “ Be merciful:
take away from us this book, if you dare not explain to
us its meaning.”
IX.
I shall conclude the present lecture by pointing out
the notable contradiction apparent between the Bible
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and the fact of the world’s present existence. The New
Testament contains scarcely a passage of any length that
does not make some allusion to the near approach of the
end of the world.
We may conceive the perplexity of children when,
after reading in ordinary history the events of the last
eighteen hundred years, with their piteous tale of cruelty
and oppression, disease and death, they open their
Bibles and read that, all those centuries ago, men were
summoned to repent because “ the kingdom of heaven ”
was then “at hand;” (Matt. iv. 17.) and find that by
“ the kingdom of heaven ” was meant, not merely a social
or moral regeneration, though the phrase is sometimes
used in this sense, but the personal second coming of
Christ, and end of all things. That both the Baptist and
Jesus preached thus : that the twelve apostles were sent
forth to preach thus; (x. 7.) that the seventy were
charged with injunctions to announce to the inhabitants
of any city-on their entry, “the kingdom of God is
come nigh unto you (Luke x. 8-11.) that Jesus repre
sented himself as a nobleman who had gone into a far
country to receive for himself a kingdom, and to return;
and instructed his disciples in these terms, “ Occupy till
I come (xix. 13.) that this was the kingdom for which
Joseph of Arimathea “ waited (xxiii. 51.) unto which
Paul prayed that he might be preserved; (2 Tim. iv. 18.)
charging Timothy to “ keep the commandment.............
until the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Tim.
vi. 14.)
How bewildering to the youthful intelligence, to per
ceive the world still going on much in its old track,
slowly elaborating its own destiny, and to find in the
records of its history no trace of the dread phenomena
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which they read in their Testaments were to portend
and accompany the return of the Son of Man and of God,
—the darkened sun, the falling stars, the bloodshot
moon, the roaring sea, the myriad hosts of heaven, the
voice of the archangel, and the trump of God; the
judgment of the quick and dead, the wailing of the lost,
and the gathering of the elect from the four winds of
heaven, the resurrection of those who slept, the ecstasy
of “we who remain,” as Paul said, (1 Thess. iv. 15-17.)
when “ caught up to meet the Lord in the air,” on his
“ coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great
glory;” (Matt. xxiv. 29-35.) for which all the disciples
were bid to watch ; (Mark xiii. 37.) and which some of
them were still to be alive on earth to see. For Jesus
had said, " Verily I say unto you, that there be some of
them that stand here now which shall not taste of death
till they have seen the kingdom of God come with
power.” (Matt. xvi. 28; Mark xi. 1; Luke xix. 27.)
“ Immediately after the tribulation of those days
and,
“ Verily I say unto you, this generation shall notpassaway,
until all these things shall be fulfilled.” (Matt. xxiv. 29,
35.) Add, too, the assurance of the angels to the disci
ples as they stood watching the Ascension, that he should
return “ in like manner;” (Acts i. 11.) add the declara
tion of Peter that “the end of all things is at hand;”
(1 Pet. iv. 7.) add the admonition of Paul to the
Romans, “ Now it is high time to awake out of sleep,
for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.
The night is far spent, the day is at hand;” (Rom. xiii.
11, 12.) “ these last days;” (Heb. i. 2.) even the days of
us “ upon whom the ends of the world are come ; ” (1 Cor.
x. 11.) add, lastly, the final book of “The Revelation,”
opening with the announcement that these things “ must
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shortly come to pass •” and concluding with the declara
tion, “ Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come,
Lord Jesus,”—a book which, claiming to be the final
utterance of divine truth, is charged with dire curses
against any who should add to it; instead of saying,
rather, “to be continued, so long as God continues to
work in man,”—add, I say, to all that has been set forth,
these and the yet other numerous similar intimations of
the then expected rapidly approaching end ; set children
to read them “ without note or comment,” but with the
belief which they will inevitably acquire, from the fact
of the Bible being put into their hands without informa
tion to the contrary,—the belief that it must therefore
be all infallibly true, that God did speak, the Lord did
say, all the things therein ascribed to him; and then,
if they retain any particle of intelligence whatever, most
surely they will have but a confused idea of God, a con
fused idea of man, and a confused idea of the relations
between them; a confused idea of right and wrong, a
confused idea of faith and fact; or rather, we may con
fidently declare, a false and pernicious idea of all things
whatsoever, in heaven and earth, from beginning to end.
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LECTURE THE SECOKD.
X.
It is not unusual for people, when pressed upon the
subject, to say, “ We do not lay much store by the Old
Testament. We concede much of what you say against
it as a teacher of morality and even of religion. We
value it chiefly as the basis and introduction of the New.
It is upon the New Testament that we take our stand.
The sufficient, and only sufficient, rule of life, its prac
tical religion and morality, are distinct and unimpeach
able.” I propose, therefore, to conclude my examination
of the effects of the popular proposition, “ that the Bible
be read without note or comment,” by showing that in
respect of its teaching, both religious and moral, even
the New Testament requires elucidation and correction
to prevent it from being productive of much that would
be immoral, irreligious, and grossly superstitious.
Passing over the innumerable discrepancies in the
gospel narratives, to reconcile which so many “ Har
monies ” have been constructed in vain, let us compare
first those utterances of the New Testament which have
regard to life—civil, political, and social. Are our chil
dren to learn from its pages to grow up to be intelligent
and independent citizens, respecting the laws, and re
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specting themselves ? It is clear that, “ without note or
comment,” they will hardly escape great perplexity of
conscience when on one side they read, “ Be subject to
principalities and powers, obey magistrates.” (Tit. iii. 1.)
“ Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit
yourselves.” (Heb. xiii. 17.) “The powers that be are
ordained of God. Whoso therefore resisteth the power,
resisteth the ordinance of God:” (Rom. xiii. 1, 2.) and
on the other side, find, that no sooner did a dilemma
arise, than “ Peter and the other apostles answered and
said, We ought to obey God rather than man.” (Acts
v. 29.)
Concerning the institution of Slavery, we find in the
Old Testament the most conflicting utterances, of which
one is, “ Of the children of the strangers that do sojourn
among you, of them shall ye buy . . . and they shall be
your possession. . . . They shall be your bondmen for
ever(Lev. xxv. 45, 46.) and another, “ Thou shalt
neither vex a stranger nor oppress him (Ex. xxxii. 21.)
both of which are in the books ascribed to Moses. While
the New Testament contains no direct reprobation of
Slavery, but rather the reverse. It must be remembered
that, wherever in our translation the word servant occurs,
the original means slave. And while masters are enjoined
to “ give unto their slaves that which is just and equal”
for their labour, and to “ forbear threatening ” them;
(Col. iv. 1; Eph. vi. 9.) it says nothing in repudiation
of the institution itself as being unjust and unequal;
but repeatedly admonishes slaves to be content with
their condition ; to “ count their masters worthy of all
honour (1 Tim. vi. 1.) and be “ obedient to them with
fear and trembling.” (Eph. vi. 5.) We read, moreover,
that Paul himself sent back to his master the slave Onesimus, after converting him to Christianity. (Philemon.)
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There are, indeed, ample grounds for fearing lest all
respect for Rights vanish in the prominence given exclu
sively to Duties. And even in the important matter of
respect and affection for parents and relatives, children
may fail to find a sufficient rule to exclude hesitation.
It is true that they read, “ Honour thy father and
mother,” for the low and unsatisfactory motive, “ that
thy days may be long.” (Ex. xx. 12.) “Husbands love
your wives.” (Eph. v. 25.) And “whoso hateth his
brother is a murderer.” (1 John iii. 15.) But there is to
be set on the other side this of Jesus himself, “ If any
man hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and chil
dren, and brethren, and sisters ... he cannot be my
disciple.” (Luke xiv. 26.)
Great will be their perplexity, too, when, after the
ordinary lessons of the schoolroom, inculcating respect
for property, the duty of industry, forethought, and thrift,
the disgrace of beggary, and evil of pauperism, they read
“ without note or comment,” “ Take therefore no thought
for the morrow“Lay not up for yourselves treasures
upon earth.” (Matt. vi. 34,19.) “ Sell whatsoever thou hast
and give to the poor;” (Mark x. 21.) and see how Jesus
backed up his communistic precepts by his practice, in
instituting the order of Mendicant Friars, by sending
forth the Twelve and the Seventy with injunctions to
“ carry neither purse nor scrip.” (Luke x. 3-7, &c.)
Neither can we consistently endeavour to cherish in
children a love of science, literature, and art, and all the
glorious uses of which man’s high faculties are capable ;
a love, in short, of that mental culture to obtain which
we expressly send them to school; if we ply them with
such contemptuous allusions to it as “ Beware lest any
man spoil you with philosophy and vain deceit; ” (Col.
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ii. 8.) “The Greeks seek after wisdom ;” (1 Cor. i. 22.)
“ Vain babblings and oppositions of science falsely so
called;” (1 Tim. vi. 20.) “Knowledge puffeth up;” (1
Cor. viii. 1.)—without telling them at the same time,
that ignorance ever “ puffeth up ” far more than know
ledge; that “science,” now-a-days stands on a very dif
ferent basis to that on which it stood in those days,
namely, on a basis of positive fact as ascertained by
actual investigation into the phenomena of the universe,
instead of on the imaginations and foregone conclusions
of men who believed in the infallibility of their mental
impressions, and pretended to knowledge independently
of experience; and that it is our highest duty and pri
vilege to cultivate “ every good gift and every perfect
gift,” intellectual and other, “ which cometh down from
the Father of lights.” (Jam. i. 17.)
Even in so simple a matter as the advantage of bear
ing a good character, they will be at a loss to determine
between “a good name is better than precious oint
ment ;” (Eccl. vii. 1.) “ it is rather to be chosen than
great riches;” (Prov. xxii. 1.) and, “Woe unto you
when all men shall speak well of you.” (Luke vi. 25.)
The Bible makes it a reproach to King Asa that “ in
his disease he sought not to the Lord, but to the physi
cians,” and significantly adds, “Asa slept with his
fathers.” (2 Chron. xvi. 12.) Of another patient it is
said that she had “ for twelve years suffered many things
of many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and
was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse,” but straight
way was healed through faith. (Mark v. 25-29.) And
there is this express injunction, “ Is any sick among you?
let him call for the elders of the Church, and let them
pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the
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Lord: and the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the
Lord shall raise him up.” (Jam. v. 14.) “Without note
or comment,” but influenced, unconsciously perhaps,
within school or without it, to regard the plain teaching
of the Bible as intended to be followed unshrinkingly,
the children in our National Schools will be apt to grow
up with the belief that it is unchristian and wicked to
call in a doctor, or to take medicine, when they are ill.
Lawyers are scarcely named but to be censured in
such terms as these: “Woe unto you lawyers ! for ye
lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye your
selves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.
Woe unto you lawyers I” (Luke xi. 45, 52.) For “with
out note or comment,” the term rendered “ lawyers,” will
inevitably be held to signify, not the expounders of Rab
binical doctrine, but the members of that eminent profes
sion which is so indispensable to the maintenance of our
rights and privileges. While the despised “ publicans ”
of Jewish times, instead of being recognised as mere
collectors of taxes, are sure to be confounded with our
own respectable company of “ licensed victuallers.”
We have seen how summarily two of the learned pro
fessions may be disposed of. Following the Bible with
out guidance by “ note or comment,” the clergy will be
in danger of faring little better than the lawyers or doc
tors. And this brings us to the subject of religious
duties as laid down in the New Testament.
It is, whether rightly or wrongly I do not venture to
decide, a subject of peculiar pride with us, that we are a
prayerful and churchgoing people. But what is really
curious is, that the practice of assembling together for pub
lic worship, we regard as essential to our character as Chris
tians. Now, how can children be expected to understand
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“without note or comment” that it is their duty to
attend “ divine service,” when they find that Jesus, who is
held up to them as the infallible pattern and guide of life,
never joined in public prayer himself, but always when
he wished to pray or meditate went apart, either “ up
into a mountain,” (Matt. xiv. 23.) or some other “ solitary
place,” (Mark i. 35.) or “ withdrew about a stone’s cast
(Luke xxii. 24.) that he only went into the synagogue or
the temple to read or to teach ; (Luke iv. 16: Matt. xxi.
23.) or to indulge in what to children and unexplained
must appear to be riotous conduct in church, namely to
drive out with blows and threats a number of persons
who were exercising a lawful industry in its precincts;
(Matt. xxi. 12.) that the persons he mentioned in one of
his parables as “ going up to the temple to pray,” (Luke
xviii. 10.) belonged to the classes he most persistently de
nounced, being a pharisee and a publican; and even these
he distinctly exonerates from the reproach of having
joined in common prayer ; that moreover, in addition to
his example, he delivered precepts absolutely prohibitory
of all public praying in these emphatic terms: “ When
thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are; for
they love to pray standing in the synagogues, and in the
corners of the streets to be seen of men. Verily, I say
unto you, They have their reward. But thou, when thou
prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut
thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy
Father which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly;”
(Matt. vi. 5, 6.)—a rule which he relaxed only on the
condition that two, or at most three, should agree upon
a subject for petition, in which case they might gather
together in his name. (Matt, xviii. 19, 20.) It is indeed
a painful perplexity in which the minds of the more sen
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sitive children will be plunged when they ask themselves
how, in the face of Christ’s most positive precepts and
example, they can continue to pray in church or chapel,
and at the same time deserve to be called by his name.
The propriety of continuing to observe the Sabbath, if
rested on the Bible alone, will remain, to say the least,
doubtful. The difference in the reasons assigned for its
institution can hardly fail to create wonder as to the
authority upon which the command said to be “ written
with the finger of God” himself, basing the appointment
upon the creation of the universe in six days, (Ex. xxxi.
17, &c.) was changed to one representing it as a memo
rial of the deliverance out of Egypt. (Deut. v. 15.)
While the institution itself is, on account of the abuses
to which it led, referred to variously by the later pro
phets ; and, in the New Testament, seems to have been
repudiated in a great measure, if not altogether, by Jesus
and the apostles; Paul distinctly admonishing the Colossians in these terms : “You hath Christ quickened. . .
blotting out the handwriting of ordinances. . . Let
no man therefore judge you . . in respect of an holi
day, . . or of the Sabbath.” (Col. ii. 13-16.) So that
something at any rate has to be added to the New Tes
tament to justify our present usage in this respect.
In the absence of explanatory comment, the statements
of scripture respecting the resurrection of the body appear
in direct conflict with each other; as also do those re
specting the after-life of the soul. In the Old Testament
we are told, “ He that goeth down £0 the grave shall
come up no more.” (Job vii. 9.) “The dead know not
anything, neither have they any more reward.” (Eccl. ix.
5, 10.) And in the New Testament, “ The trumpet shall
sound, and the dead shall be raised(1 Cor. xv. 52.)
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“Then shall he reward every man according to his
works.” (Matt. xvi. 27.) While the narratives of the
ascent of Enoch and Elijah seem to find a positive con
tradiction in the declaration of Jesus, “No man hath
ascended up to heaven but he that came down from
heaven, even the son of man;” and the narrative makes
him add, “ which is in heaven,” putting what appears to
be an absurd contradiction into the mouth of Jesus.
(John iii. 12.)
And even concerning the status of Jesus himself, expla
nations are needed to reconcile the various contradictory
declarations; “I and my Father are one.” (John x. 30.)
“ He thought it not robbery to be equal with God.”
(Phil. ii. 6.) “ Jesus increased in wisdom and stature,
and in favour with God and man.” (Luke ii. 52.) “ My
Father is greater than I.” (John xiv. 28.) “ Of that day
and that hour knoweth no man. . . Neither the Son,
but the Father.” (Mark xiii. 32.) And his agonised ex
clamation when dying, which we can easily believe to
have been held up by the clergy of those days as uttered
in remorse of soul for a life spent in opposition to the
church orthodoxy of his country,—“ My God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me ?” (Matt, xxvii. 46.)
XI.
Much stress has been laid by orthodox writers on the
“ Continuity,” or uninterrupted connection, of Scripture.
The inference which they have drawn from the con
sistency existing between its various parts, is that it
must all be alike the result of one divine harmonious
scheme. That such Continuity exists it is impossible to
help seeing, but the extent to which it exists, and its
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significance in relation to what is called doctrinal
religion, are likely, “ without note or comment,” wholly
to escape the observation of youthful scholars.
The whole religious system of the Old Testament rests
upon the theory that the object of Religion is, not the
exaltation of man, but the delectation of the Deity; and
the stimulants offered in it to the practice of religion are
of the most material and seductive kind, wealth, honour,
long life, numerous posterity. In the New Testament
the same idea is continued, with this difference, that
experience having demonstrated the theory to be unsound
as regards this life, inasmuch as prosperity does not by
any means always accompany virtue, nor adversity vice,
rewards and punishments are there reserved for a future
state of existence, in a region inaccessible to verification
by experience.
Two other instances of Continuity between the two
divisions of Scripture may be classed together as being
intimately connected with each other. These are, the
institution of Sacrifice, and the character of the Jewish
Deity. To the instances already given of the amazing
ferocity of this Being, as represented in the Sacred Books
of the Jews, may be added the tremendous threats and
penalties denounced for the smallest transgressions, the
readiness to dart forth from the mountain and deal
destruction upon any who might but touch it; and the
perpetual demand for blood. This propensity for blood
constitutes a notable instance of Continuity in the
character of the God of the Bible. Blood of animals;
blood of peoples hostile to the Israelites; blood of
transgressors among the Israelites; and in numerous
instances, blood of unoffending men, women, and
children, even from among his own chosen people.
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(1 Sam. vi. 19 ; 2 Sam. xxiv. 15 ; Ezek. ix. 6 ; &c.) We
have already dealt with David’s sacrifice of the seven
sons of Saul: “ They hanged them in the hill before
the Lord. .... and after that God was entreated for
the land;” (2 Sam. xxi.) Jephthah’s sacrifice of his
daughter; (Jud. xi.) and Abraham’s attempt to sacri
fice his son. (Gen. xxii.) Of this last I must speak
more fully, because there are, holding high positions
both in the church and in popular estimation, as thinkers
and scholars, men who insist on drawing from it a moral
which they deem favourable to the character of the deity
as represented in the Jewish Scriptures. But at present
they have failed to do more than read back into the
Bible the civilisation of their age and their own personal
amiability. So far from their being justified in regard
ing the arrest of Abraham as a protest on the part of
the Deity against the prevailing custom of human sacri
fices, the narrative distinctly asserts that “ God tempted
Abraham ” to commit the horrid deed: that his consent
to commit it was accepted at the time as an “ act of faith,”
and rewarded by a renewal of the promise of a numerous
posterity; and not only is there in the Scriptures no
expression whatever commending him for refraining
from completing the sacrifice, but the New Testament
treats it approvingly as being as good as completed,
saying in one place, “ By faith Abraham, when he was
tried, offered up Isaac; and he that had received the
promises offered up his only-begotten son;” (Heb. xi. 17.)
and in another place, “Was not Abraham our father
justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son
upon the altar ? Seest thou how faith wrought with his
works, and by works faith was made perfect ?” (Jam. ii.
21, 22.)
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So far from the principle of human sacrifices, or the
belief in a deity who required to be propitiated by blood,
being repudiated in the New Testament, “the Continuity
of Scripture ” is in these respects plain and indisputable,
and the principle is carried to a height undreamt of in
Old Testament times. The God of the Jewish priests
requires at length the blood of his own “ only-begotten,”
“ beloved ” son ! It is only when this tremendous climax
has been reached that the dread thirst is appeased. This
is the fundamental argument of the eminently sacerdotal
epistle to the Hebrews, (of unknown authorship). In it
we are assured that “ without shedding of blood there is
no remission of sins.” (Heb. ix. 22.) A human parent, not
in this respect “ made in the image of God,” can forgive
a repenting errant child. The divine parent, made by
priests, and at once unhuman and inhuman, must have
his “pound of flesh” from somebody. This epistle tells
us concerning Christ that “ neither by the blood of goats
and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into
the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for
us............... So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of
many;” (ix. 12, 28.) thus adopting and justifying the
view of the high-priest Caiaphas, who, by virtue of his
sacerdotal office, counselled and I prophesied that Jesus
should die for the people;” (John xi. 50, 51.) — a
view shared even by John himself, who in one of his
epistles declares that “ God sent his only begotten Son
to be the propitiation for our sins.” (1 John iv. 9, 10.)
Thus early were the attempts of Jesus to abolish sacer
dotalism, and promulgate purer notions of the Deity,
defeated by his own disciples, or by those who wrote in
their names; and the reformation which constituted the
real Christianity, overlaid and stifled by “ the Church.”
I
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Let the churches called Christian, demonstrate, if they
will, their “ Continuity ” with the most hideous of
Jewish superstitions ; and cherish the recollection of the
worst side of the Jewish Divinity, by perpetual repetitions
of the rite which, while declining to practice it simply
“ in remembrance ” of a loved and lost benefactor, they
yet profanely style “the holy Eucharist.” Say they, it
requires a miracle to keep the church up ? Well, perhaps
it does. But if we who “ have not so learned Christ ”
are to act consistently with our more advanced ideas of
religion and morality, the “notes and comments” by which
the reading of these passages in our schools is accom
panied, must direct attention rather to the higher and
better teaching of prophetical lips ; “ the sacrifices of
God are a contrite heart; ” (Ps. li. 17.) “ he saveth such
as be of a contrite spirit;” (xxxiv. 18.) and “ dwelleth
with him that is of a contrite and humble spirit;” (Is. lvii.
15.) as well as that of Jesus himself, “If a man love
me he will keep my words; and my Father will love
him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with
him.” (John xiv. 23.) There is no savour of blood here.
If an education is.to be imparted that is consistent
with “ the development of the intellect and mor^J sense,”
the doctrine that justice can be satisfied by the substitu
tion of the innocent for the guilty, must be rigidly ex
cluded from our schools. It is true that this doctrine is
not without a certain significance; that there is a way by
which the position of the wicked may be bettered through
the condemnation of the righteous. For the punishment
of the innocent involves the divine law of justice being,
not fulfilled, but so utterly shattered and destroyed, as to
be thenceforth absolutely non-existent. The sinner’s gain,
therefore, would consist in there being no law of justice
by which he could be arraigned.
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But so invincibly implacable is the deity of at least a
great portion of the New Testament, that even such stu
pendous atonement fails to gain him over. Its benefits
are confined to a fortunate few, and his fury towards the
rest is redoubled. As Burns says, he
“ Sends ane to heaven, and ten to hell
A’ for his glory.”
The penalties of evil-doing are infinitely enhanced, and
they are applied to a fresh class of offences. Here, too,
Continuity is combined with progression; but it is,
morally, a progression backwards. The Old Testament
consigns no one to eternal punishment, neither does it
make penal the conclusions of the intellect. The New
Testament abounds in menaces of the most fearful cha
racter, not only against malefactors, but also against un
believers. It represents the Almighty, when punishing
the reprobate, as uninfluenced by anything analogous to
the human motive of promoting the security of society or
the reformation of the criminal, but inflicting torture in
the spirit of a fiend, out of pure malignity, because with
no advantage to any. “ The unbelieving and the abomi
nable” are classed together, and, we read, “shall have their
part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone;”
(Rev. xxi. 8.) “where their worm dieth not, and the
fire is not quenched;” (Mark ix. 44.) “there shall be
weeping and gnashing of teeth.” (Matt. viii. 12.) “Depart
ye cursed,” is the final doom of those who had failed to
recognise Christ on earth, “ depart ye cursed into ever
lasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” (Matt,
xxv. 41.)
Nay, more than this. The gospels, as we have them,
actually represent Jesus himself as pronouncing sentence
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of damnation upon all who cannot work miracles. His
last words to his disciples are thus reported: “Go ye
into all the world, and preach the gospel to every crea
ture. . . He that helieveth not shall be damned.
And these signs shall follow them that believe: in my
name they shall cast out devils; they shall speak with
new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they
drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them; they shall
lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.” (Mark
xiv. 16.) Not to work miracles is not to believe, and
not to believe is to be damned. Is it not certain that if
the young are allowed to read the New Testament with
out explanation or correction by “note or comment,”
they will, as have millions of tender souls to their in
expressible terror and anguish, find the gospel of Jesus to
be to them but a gospel of damnation ?
Let us return to this world and the practical concerns
of life. In its manner of dealing with the crucial act of
life, marriage, and its treatment of the relations of the
sexes generally, the New Testament takes, in regard to
the Old, a great step backwards. A demonstration of its
vacillation and utter inadequacy to provide rules for the
conduct of civilised life on this most important of all
points connected with morals, will fitly conclude this
division of the subject. To the commendation of impotency uttered by Jesus, the stress laid by him upon mere
physical fidelity, (Matt. xix. 9, 12.) and his disregard of
all incongruity or incompatibility of character or affec
tion, as a plea for separation, (a peculiarity which we
have in our institutions but too faithfully followed), must
be added these sentences of Paul: “ Art thou bound to a
wife ? Seek not to be loosed. Art thou loosed from a
wife 1 Seek not to be bound. . . It is better to marry
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than to burn,” and, “ good for the present distress.” (1 Cor.
vii. 27, 9, 29.) Hardly from this will our youth learn to
recognise love as capable of being a pure and an elevating
influence, or to give to Christianity the credit, so often
claimed for it, of having raised woman from the depressed
position in which that age found her. It will be in vain
that they read “Marriage is honourable in all,” (Heb.
xiii. 4.) when they find the prevailing spirit of the
gospel to be ascetic, exalting absolute chastity as one of
the loftiest of virtues, and denouncing all natural desire
as sinful in itself. (1 Cor. vii. 1, 38; Rev. xiv. 4.) Will
not the later teaching of Scripture appear to them to
have receded sadly in its fitness for humanity, from the
earlier which commanded men to “ increase and multi
ply;” (Gen. i. 28.) commended a virtuous woman as “a
crown to her husband;” (Prov. xii. 4.) and pronounced a
blessing on “children and the fruit of the womb;” (Ps.
cxxvii. 3, &c.) and, in so far as the relations of the
sexes are concerned, excite in them a preference for the
Jewish regime over the Christian 1
The number is beyond all reckoning, of women, the
best and noblest of their sex, the most fitted to be the
mothers and early trainers of mankind, who through a
superstitious regard to this characteristic of the New
Testament, have renounced their natural “ high calling,”
leaving to inferior types the fulfilment of the functions
upon the right exercise of which the progress, elevation,
and happiness of mankind depend ; who have withdrawn
themselves from the duties of real life into artificial
isolation, through a conscientious but mistaken belief,
that in practising the selfishness of the devotee, they are
seeking a virtue which is possible only through the exer
cise of the affections. It is in vain that Paul in his
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riper experience wrote, “ I will that the younger women
marry, bear children, guide the house,” (1 Tim. v. 14.)
when Churches persist in making so much of his earlier
utterance delivered, as he himself acknowledges, with
hesitation and doubt. “ The unmarried woman careth
for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both
in body and spirit: but she that is married careth for
the things of the world, how she may please her hus
band,” and . . . “ I think that I have the spirit of God,”
(1 Cor. vii. 34, 40.)—as if the best, the only way of serv
ing God was not by serving man. This is but an
expression and echo of that same Manichaean principle
of Asceticism, which has led alike Pagans and Christians
innumerable to despise the material world. Blasphem
ously divorcing the Creator from his work, it teaches
that nature is so utterly corrupt and wrong, that the
more we go against and mortify it, the more likely we
are to be pure and right.
‘ And so it comes that woman, while promoted theo
logically to be “Queen of Heaven” and “Mother of
God,” ecclesiastically is regarded as a mistake of nature,
a thing to be snubbed and repressed, and condemned to
the living death of an enforced celibacy.’
One whom I dare to call the greatest of our philo
sophers, Herbert Spencer, has epitomised in a single
sentence all that can be said on this subject:—“Morality
is essentially one with physical truth. It is a kind of
transcendental physiology.” (“ Social Statics.”) It is
.through ignorance of this, the real basis and nature of
morality, that myriads of the best women in Christendom
have, in every generation, to the incalculable loss of the
whole species, made the saddest shipwreck both of their
own lives and of the lives which by their sweet and holy
influence they might have rendered supremely blest.
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There is a “ Higher Law” of morality which impels
ns to suppress our own affections and desires, not through
hope of reward here or hereafter; not through deference
to conventional standards, hut solely through an un
selfish regard to the feelings of those to whom it is our
lot to be allied. But that such a law is to be the law of
our lives, and sole standard of virtue, we find no intima
tion in the Testament, Old or New.
XII.
Yet, notwithstanding the failure of the Bible to pro
vide an authoritative or satisfactory rule either of morals
or of religion, I hold that, both for its own intrinsic
merits, and for the place which it occupies in the litera
ture and history of ourselves and of mankind, it ought
not to be excluded from the educational course of our
children.
It was proposed in the London School-board to exclude
it on the ground that its use as a religious text-book
outside the schools, makes its admission into the schools
inconsistent with religious equality. It certainly would
be, as is generally allowed, an act of gross unfairness to
admit partisan theology into a common school. But,
happily, as is also very generally allowed, speculative
dogma and practical religion are very far indeed from
being one and the same thing; and even those who
object most strongly to dogma in itself, desire to see
children brought up religiously, that is with reverential
regard for divine truth and law.
If fairness and impartiality forbid the Bible to be in
troduced and used as the text-book of any party or sect,
they equally forbid it to be excluded for happening to be
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such a text-book. For this would equally constitute
dogmatic teaching, though of a negative kind. Perfect
fairness requires that the question of the introduction
and use of a book within the schools, should not be in
any way dependent upon dogmatic opinions entertained
respecting it by parties outside the schools. Perfect
fairness forbids that anything which is good and instruc
tive in itself, be excluded merely on account of the source
from which it is derived; be it from Turk, Infidel, Heretic,
Pagan, Jew, or Christian. It is here that the limitation
imposed by our definition of education, comes to our aid,
“ The cultivation of the intelligence and moral sense” by
means of “ whatsoever things are true, pure, and honest;”
“ that fear God, and work righteousness;” and are “pro
fitable for doctrine (or teaching), for reproof, for correc
tion, for instruction in righteousness.”
Thus, in the common schools, nothing must be taught
as being the “ Word of God,” or as not being the “ Word
of God either assertion being equally dogmatic. But
everything must be allowed to derive its force from its
own intrinsic character. And. those who hold that the
children ought to be taught to regard the Bible as being,
or containing, exclusively the “ Word of God,” will only
betray their own want of faith if they express misgivings
lest that word fail to assert its own efficacy and speak its
own divine message to the soul, without special enforce
ment as such by the schoolmaster.
Perhaps, too, upon the idea being put before them,
they will even acquiesce in the suggestion, that for any
man, be he schoolmaster or priest, or any body of men,
lay or cleric, ancient or modern, even though dignified
by the title of “ General Council,” to take upon them
selves the responsibility of determining or declaring what
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is, or what is not, “ the Word of God,” is to lay them
selves open to the charge of the most stupendous pre
sumption of which finite being can possibly be guilty:
a presumption which is no other than that of declaring
themselves to be infallible, and entitled to sit in the
temple of God as if they were God. (2 Thess. ii. 4.)
And further, to declare that the Bible is or contains
exclusively “ the Word of God,” is to forbid the souls of
men to find a divine message elsewhere than in the
Bible. It is to dictate to God as well as to man. For
it is to forbid God to make of others “ ministers to do
his will.” (Ps. ciii. 21; Heb. i. 24.) It is to extract all
meaning from the saying of Jesus, “ Lo, I am with you
alway, even unto the end of the world.” (Matt, xxviii. 20.)
It is to reject that “ Spirit of truth” who was promised
to “guide us into all truth.” (John xvi. 13.) It is to
“ quench the Spirit that giveth life,” in “ the letter that
killeth.” (1 Thess. v. 1, 9; 2 Cor. iii. 6.) It is to insist
that the Almighty speak to men, like a clergyman of the
Establishment, only from a text in the Bible. Let us, if
we will, define as “ the Word of God” that which “feareth
him and worketh righteousness;” but let us not dog
matise as to what particular author or composition comes
under that category^ For “ the Word of God” can only
be the word or thought of which God makes use to im
press the heart of any. If we “ search the Scriptures,”
we find that neither by the writers of the Psalms, by the
prophets, nor by Jesus, scarcely, if ever, is the phrase
used to denote that which was already written, but only
the deeper impression then present in the mind of the
speaker or writer. If not used by God to impress the
heart, it is then not “ his word.” The same utterance
may be “ his word” on one occasion, and not on another.
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Varying for each person, it is not always the same for
any person, inasmuch as that which impresses us in
one mood, does not necessarily affect us in another. A
“ word of God” cannot fail, any more than a “ law of
God” can be broken. Any definition of Deity that does
not exclude such a possibility, is an utterly inadequate
definition, and one dishonouring to God.
But in the matter of the education of the young, we
have to use our best judgment in apportioning the means
to the end we have in view. And therefore we must
put into their hands such reading only as is plainly
adapted for their edification, whether we take it from
the Bible or from any other book. It is for children to
to be in statu pupillari to men. It is for men to be in
statu pupillari to God.
I hold, then, that the Bible should be used in our com
mon schools, First, for its intrinsic merits. In its pages
we find the most complete revelation of humanity to be
found in any written book, showing the gradual growth
of the moral and spiritual faculties from the most rudi
mentary ages to the Christiaii era. We find this mainly
in the exhibition of the rise and development, however
irregular, of the idea of God, until, from a Being so
limited in his nature and operations as to be able to
sympathise and side with only a few individuals or a
particular race, partaking all the deficiencies of their own
gross, rude natures, bribed by gifts, appeased by sacri
fices, partial, cruel, jealous, capricious, the patron and in
stigator of blood-thirsty and fraudulent men and actions,
the resort and associate of “ lying spirits,” and sharing
his sovereignty with the devil, — he is at length pre
sented to us as “ the high and holy one that inhabiteth
eternity;” (Is. lviii. 15.) “ the righteous judge;” (Rev.
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xix. 11.) “creator of all things;” (Gen. i. 1, &c.)
“ Saviour of all men;” (1 Tim. iv. 10.) “ whose kingdom
ruleth over all.” (Ps. ciii. 19).
Here we find first recorded the existence of a sense of
responsibility for our actions to a law and a power which
are above us. “ Here human nature is drawn in all its
extent, from its lowest depths to its loftiest reach; for the
Bible is a gallery in which all the paintings are life-like,
but the subjects so varied, that none are too gross for
admission. Being a revelation of God according to the
characters and imaginations of the men in whose con
sciousness his idea was conceived, it is emphatically a
revelation of man, inasmuch as man’s ideal is the index
to his own character and degree of intelligence.
This, however, is no speciality of the Bible. It is the
characteristic of all art and literature which speaks out
the genuine deeper feelings of men’s hearts ; and in this
respect, as containing the truest art, the Bible ranks as
the highest classics.
In selecting from the world’s literature, reading lessons
inculcating “ the true, the* pure, and the lovely,” who
could have the heart to exclude the remarkable hymn of
the creation; the significant allegory of Eden; the charm
ing pastoral of Isaac and Rebekah in their first love; the
touching idyl of Joseph and his brethren and their aged
father; the wondrous romance of the Exodus; the story
of Moses, that king of men; the noble recitations of law
and legend in Deuteronomy; the interesting narratives of
Samson, Samuel, David, and Solomon; the simple tales
of Ruth and of Esther, so illustrative of the manners of
the ancient east; the sublime poetry of Job and the
Psalms; the shrewd wisdom of the Proverbs; the genial
cynicism of Ecclesiastes; the magnificent outpourings of
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Isaiah, denouncing the degradation and despair of his
countrymen, and encouraging them anew to hope and to
restoration through the moral regeneration of their
nature ? (Which of us even now could not point out
some nation that has sore need of an Isaiah ?) Then the
noble lesson of Jonah, wherein children are oftener
taught to see a tale of a cross-grained prophet, a whale,
and a gourd, than to recognise the poet’s protest against
the popular notion, shared by Jonah, that the Lord was
a mere district-god who could be avoided by change of
place, and to see the moral of the fable in the representa
tion of deity as everywhere present alike, even in the
depths of the sea.
And, added to these, the exquisite purity and simpli
city of the gospels, with their central figure of Jesus and
his enthusiastic life-devotion to the cause of man’s re
demption from sin and suffering, and deliverance from
the blighting effects of religious formalism, and the
crushing weight of sacerdotalism; producing from the
harmonious depths of his own great soul a sublime ideal
of God as a Father, and a rule of life for man most noble
in conception even when most impracticable of applica
tion. (Of all the characters of history, I know of none
who would have sympathised more intensely with the
object and the views I am seeking to advance, than the
Christ whom I find in the gospels. Of course to the or
thodox and the vested interests of his day, he was only a
sad blasphemer and dangerous revolutionist.) Then, the
varied and genuine humanity of the Epistles; and, no
tably, the magnificent monologue on charity, (in the thir
teenth chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians,)
wherein Paul, dropping his too favourite character of
Rabbinical lawyer and quibbling controversialist, soars to
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an altitude whither the churches have never yet been
able to follow him. And, lastly, the lofty rhapsody of
the Apocalypse, wherein fervid imagination, escaping
from the woes beneath which mankind was being crushed
by a Domitian and a Nero, took refuge in an ideal
“ state of God,” where all wrongs should be redressed,
all tears wiped away, the tormentors relegated to ever
lasting punishment, and sorrow and pain be no more for
their victims.
And not for its intrinsic merits only, but for its in
fluence’ on the hearts of mankind, should our children not
be strangers to the volume in which, to borrow words
from one of our most highly inspired writers, “book after
book,Law and truth and example, oracle and lovely hymn,
and choral song of ten thousand thousand, and accepted
prayers of saints and prophets, sent back as it were from
heaven, like doves to be let loose again with a new
freight of spiritual joys and griefs and necessities; where
the hungry have found food, the thirsty a living spring,
the feeble a staff, and the victorious warfarer songs of
welcome and strains of music: which for more than a
thousand years has gone hand in hand with civilisation,
. . often leading the way. . . a book which good
and holy men, thepest and wisest of mankind, the kingly
spirits of historyl enthroned in the hearts of mighty
nations, have borne witness to its influences, and declared
to be beyond compare the most perfect instrument, the
only adequate organ of humanity; the organ and instru
ment of all the gifts, powers, and tendencies, by which
the individual is privileged to rise above himself.”*
To exclude all knowledge of the Bible from our youth,
would be to make a greater gap in the education of a
* S.T. Coleridge’s “Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit.”
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Briton than to omit almost any calculable number of
other books, including the bulk of the world’s history.
Indeed it would be to exclude almost all history what
soever; not ancient history merely, with knowledge of
Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Rome in its decline and fall;
but the history of all Christendom itself, with that of the
Papacy and the Reformation, and the whole of our own
struggles for and against liberty | (for even we have not
always been consistently on the side of freedom:) almost
all of which struggles have been associated more or less
with the Bible; the rise and origin, too, of the United
States of America. All these in the past, together with
our own condition in the present and hopes in the future,
and the signification of the vast bulk of our literature,
would, without some knowledge of the book that has
filled a leading part in them all, be absolutely dark and
meaningless.
Besides, there is not so much wisdom and beauty in
the world that we can afford to throw any away. If we
exclude the Bible altogether as being a text-book of our
own religious sects, there is no plea upon which we can
admit the admirable teaching that is to be found in the
sacred books of the Hindoos and Chinese, the Mohamme
dans and Buddhists. Nay, to exclude the good parts of
any book merely because it happens to be the text-book
of a sect, is to put it in the power of any small knot of
persons to secure the exclusion of any book whatsoever,
by claiming it as one of their sacred books. Fancy a sect
of Shakespeare worshippers getting by such means all
knowledge of Shakespeare excluded from our educational
course ! Or a new sect of Pythagoreans to revive the
worship of numbers, and, setting up Colenso as their highpriest, forcing us to exclude arithmetic from our schools !
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Indeed, if only because of the very power and popular
ity of the Bible, it should not be left to be dealt with
exclusively by a class of interpreters who acknowledge
other allegiance than to the developed intellect and con
science of men. But, containing as it does, the whole
sacred literature of the most remarkable of all ancient
peoples, the Jews, and that of their most remarkable
sect of religious reformers, the Christians, who, together,
more than any other people, have influenced the develop
ment of the human mind and the course of human his
tory; to exclude all knowledge of it from our youth
would be to keep back from them the master-key to the
heart and facts of humanity.
XIII.
But the fact of the Bible being, not a single book, but
a whole literature ranging over many centuries, greatly
simplifies the question of dealing with it. We rarely use
the whole of any book in the schoolroom; never an entire
literature. Imagine the whole, or samples of the whole, of
our own literature being put at once into the hands of a
child, with its rude early legends and ballads, its laws and
statutes, its medicine and science, its trials and police
reports, and all the revolting details which even the least
respectable of our newspapers suppress as “ unfit for pub
lication !” Yet this is what we have done with the
ancient literature of the Jews. Instead of exercising any
discrimination, we crowd our houses with it, we read it
aloud to our families, we put it entire into the hands of
■our children; and when we find impurity and supersti
tion rife among us, instead of admitting that we have
■done our best to promote them, we postulate the horrible
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doctrines of “ original sin ” and “ total depravity,” and
shift the responsibility from our own shoulders to those
of “the devil!” It was remarked once by a well-known
Frenchman that “the English tolerate no indecencies
except in their Bibles.” Fatal exception, when we print
Bibles in millions, in all the languages of the earth, and
thrust them into the hands of every babe and suckling
and growing youth.
The remedy which I propose is twofold : First, that a
new version, omitting the whole of the parts which are
objectionable on the score of decency, omitting also the
headings by which ecclesiastical editors have sought to
palliate immorality or strain the meaning to the support
of particular doctrines, be made to take the place of the
existing “ authorised versionand that this be done
so completely that the old version be no longer accessible
to the young, but continue to exist only as a curiosity
or book of reference upon the shelves of students.
This change is one which, while it might be'initiated
by the School-boards undertaking to produce such a
version for the use of their schools, would require both
general and individual action on the part of the people
themselves. It will be aided by the wise resolve of the
Bible-revision Committee to omit the headings from their
new and improved version. If the powers of this Com
mittee were extended so as to enable it to make these
changes, a great step towards carrying out this part of
my proposed remedy would be gained. To further it
would be an admirable occupation for a society which
has existed for years among us under the presidency of
Lord Shaftesbury, calling itself “ The Pure Literature
Society.” Strange to say that, with all its zeal for
purity in literature, it has never yet tried its hand on
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the Bible. It will indeed prove itself worthy of its high
title and calling, when it joins in the chase of the
“ authorised version ” from our homes, and the pews of
our churches, so that children shall no longer be tempted
to beguile the tedium of a sermon by feeding their
curiosity on its improprieties.
It is related of Goethe that he was present at a meeting
of the Dutch clergy, when it was proposed to establish
a censorship to enforce the expurgation of any improper
books which might be brought forward for publication!
Goethe at once expressed his admiration of the plan, and
recommended that they commence with the Bible.
Whereupon the king of Holland said to him, “ My dear
Goethe, pray hold your tongue. Of course you are quite
right: but it won’t do to say so.”
This, however, is not enough. There are, as we have
seen, very many portions of the Bible which, while not
totally “ unfit for publication,” are yet shocking, to the
intellect and moral sense if accepted literally as true,
inasmuch as they are libellous to the Deity. I propose,
therefore, Secondly, that teachers be required, alike by
School-boards and by parents, whenever such portions
of Scripture are read,—(and they ought to be read, if
only to show the advance we have made)—to make their
pupils clearly understand that they represent only the
imperfect notions of a barbarous age and people. ' That
just as the Greeks had their supreme ruling divinity in
Zeus, their divinity of song in Apollo, of war in Ares, of
gain in Hermes, of storms in JEolus, of wisdom in Pallas,
and of love in Aphrodite; so the Jews, instead of dis
tributing these functions among a number of distinct
divinities, ascribed them all in turn, no matter how
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incongruously, as occasion required, to their own Jehovah.
By turn he is a “ man of war,” he is “love,” he is “fire,”
he “ rides on the wings of the wind,” and so on.
We cannot even accord to the Jews the credit, often
claimed for them, of being, in a world of polytheists, the
only pure monotheists. It is true that their institutions
forbade the worship of more than one God.; but they
recognised the existence of many gods. They were
monotheists in worship, but not in faith. Their Jehovah
was a far too unsociable, exclusive, “jealous” God, to
share their homage with others. He thus was made
strictly in the image of the Jews themselves, the most
exclusive of human races. That Baal and Chemosh,
Ashtoreth and Molech, were all realities for them, is
shown in frequent utterances ascribed even to Jehovah
himself. And Solomon, though “ the wisest of men,”
established their worship in Jerusalem. The Bible
shows, tod, by numerous instances, that the Jews were
by no means satisfied with their own deity. The minds
of their loftiest poets, indeed, occasionally, in their
loftiest moods, rose to the conception of a deity, one and
universal; but they did this in common only with the
loftiest minds of all peoples, ages, and religions; those
minds whose opinions have ever been regarded by the
conventional and superstitious as atheistic and blasphem
ous, whether it be Socrates, Spinoza, Shelley, or Jesus.
But even if the Jews acknowledged but one God, they
called him by various names ; and it would be an addi
tional safeguard against superstition if, in the new
version, those names were preserved. In translating
the Latin and Greek writers we never think of substitu
ting God for Jupiter or Apollo. There is no valid
reason for dealing differently with Jehovah, Elohim,
Adonai, Shaddai.
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This, then, is the whole conclusion :—
(1.) That the Bible should be admitted into the
schools; but it must be a purified, an expurgated Bible;
and (2.) That its reading must be accompanied by such
“ notes and comments ” as will make it really conducive
to the development of the Intelligence and Moral Sense
of the scholars.
But to minister to these ends, it must be read with no
adventitious solemnity that might specialise it as a
superior authority, and invest it with a preter-educational
character. For this would at once be to remove it from
the category of legitimate educational uses, by exempting
it from the operation of the normal digestive apparatus
of the intellect. In short, to make the Bible useful for
education, it must be taught comparatively. And as this
implies the possession of a certain amount of related
knowledge, it is clear that there is but very little of it
that is suited to the very young or very ignorant.
XIV.
Now for the general principle on which these u notes
and comments ” should be based.
It is universally acknowledged that the human mind
is endowed with a tendency to imagine the Deity as pos
sessed in perfection of all the qualities which are recog
nised by itself as best. The strength of this tendency is
ever in inverse proportion to the degree of the mind’s
development, being greatest in the most rudimentary
stage of intelligence.
Investing the Deity with the attributes of personality,
the finite mind cannot do otherwise than make God in
its own image. The character of that image is the mea
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sure of our own moral and spiritual capacity. For, when
by God we mean the ideal of our own imagination, it
follows that the character of our God indicates the de
gree of our own development. Later on, when the mind
attains a certain advanced stage of intellectual progress,
we find our conception of Deity so transcendently en
larged, that no definition satisfies us, save one which re
cognises Him as the sum of all the forces, physical, moral,
and spiritual, at work in the universe; the divine work,
which we call Nature, being the sum of all phenomena.
God the sum of causes, Nature the sum of effects. This
is no dogma. It is only a definition of what we mean
by God, what by nature.
For the purposes of early education, however, we have
to deal with God in a moral aspect, as the Ideal of
Humanity j the perfection towards which it is our high
est function to strive. Wherefore, nothing can be more
fatal to our moral progress than to have that ideal de
graded to a low type of character. If we are to call him
“ Fool,” who, denying cause and effect, says, “ there is
no God,” (Ps. xiv. 1.) what are we to say of him who
teaches that God is evil ? What, again, are we to call
those who, holding that God is absolutely good, and that
a firm belief in that goodness is requisite to enable man
to be good also, and who, moreover, desire to cultivate
goodness in their children, yet hesitate not to put into
the hands of those children narratives of impurity,
cruelty, and deceit, and tell them that the perpetrators
and their deeds were acceptable to, and indeed prompted
by, the Deity ? If the purpose of right education be to
develop the moral sense, what sort of education is this ?
If another- purpose be to develop the intellect, how is this
end to be served, when the only way of escape that such
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teachers have, on being questioned by their perplexed
pupils, lies in declaring it to be a “ mystery,” and so
closing the doors of their intelligence the moment it
begins to expand ? .
Keeping in mind the remarks I have made respecting
the inevitable anthropomorphism of all imperfectly de
veloped minds, you will perceive that it involves no
reproach to the Jews that, in those early stages of human
progress, they partook of the universal tendency, and
constructed their God in their own image; that they
credited him with the qualities, moral and immoral,
which they found in themselves; and, in their total
ignorance of natural law and phenomena, were more ready
to seek the divine hand in departures from the regular
order of nature, than to recognise it in its establishment
and maintenance. It is thus that all early literatures
necessarily contain prodigies and fables illustrative of the
imperfect notions of their period. And so far from these
things being true because they are in the Bible, or a re
proach to the Jews in being untrue, the miracle really
would have been if there were no miracles, no anthro
pomorphism, in the Scriptures. In this sense, therefore,
it may be said that the truth of the Bible is proved by
the untruths of the Bible.
Even if we give the Jews credit as having done their
best for the honour of their god in thus constructing him
in their own image, we assuredly cannot lay claim to
similar credit for ourselves. For we have fallen infinitely
below our own best, in the character we have assigned
to our God. Think for a moment how marvellous is the
anomaly we present. For six days of the week we avail
ourselves freely of the wondrous results of the most ad
vanced science and culture, philosophy and thought, of
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this nineteenth century after Christ, in which the labours
of all former centuries have culminated, and we do this for
our own advantage and enjoyment; and on the seventh
day, when the honour of our God is concerned, we are con
tent to jump back to the nineteenth century before Christ,
and borrow for him both character and lineaments from
a semi-barbarous Syrian tribe, whose whole literature
proves their absolute incapacity to comprehend the
simplest of his works in nature. And in their image,
fitful and vengeful, we make our God, refusing him the
benefits of the light we have gained. A wondrous feat
of moral and intellectual athletics is this our weekly
jump backward and then-forward again.
The resolution finally passed by the London Board
provides that “ the Bible shall be read, and there shall
be given therefrom such instruction in the principles of
religion and morality, as is suitable to the capacities of
children, no attempt being made to attach the children
to any particular denomination.”
Thus, the Bible is to be read “ with notes and com
ments.” If, however, these notes and comments are not
to be of the kind I have just described, the Resolution
means absolutely nothing. If the teachers are not to
explain that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Samuel, David,
and Solomon, were, in respect of the acts which have been
enumerated, exceedingly bad men, and that the deity
who is said in the Bible to have approved of them, was
but the imaginary local divinity of the Hebrews as re
presented by their priests, the Resolution is nothing but
an illusion and a blind. If the teacher is not to say that
Abraham was wrong to follow his impulse to sacrifice
his son; Jacob wrong to cheat his nearest and dearest
relations ; Samuel wrong to revoke his sovereign’s pledge
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of clemency, and rebelliously to set up a rival to him;
David wrong to sacrifice the sons of Saul, and to order
the execution of the man he had sworn to spare; if
he is not to say that Jesus and the apostles were mis
taken in expecting the early end of the world rand
re-appearance of Christ; that the story of his birth
is a piece of mere paganism, and that many of the
injunctions in the New Testament are not fitting rules
for civilised life—the Resolution is utterly devoid
of meaning. I am not saying that it may not be per
fectly sound theology to praise Abraham and Jacob for
these things, and represent the deity as approving of
them, but only that it is neither good religion nor good
morality; and it is not theology, but religion and mor
ality, which, both by the Education Act and the Resolu
tion, the teacher is bound to inculcate. Even if it be
true that morality is based upon religion, the religion
containing such theology can certainly not claim to be in
any way connected with morality. And to teach it will
be to go directly in the face of the Resolution which
provides “ that instruction be given from the Bible in
the principles,” not of theology, but “of religion and
morality.” Wherefore, when a question arises in the
schools, such as that of the propriety of Abraham’s com
pliance, of Jael’s treachery, or of Caiaphas’s counsel to
offer up Jesus in human sacrifice as an atonement for the
people;—the teacher acting in accordance with our
definition and the Board’s Resolution, will have no
choice but to reply, “ The justification of these actions
belongs to the domain of theology. Morality unequivo
cally condemns them. And my duty here is to teach
you morality.”
And this, I think, settles the question which has been
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raised since the passing of the Resolution, namely, the
question, Who is to give Biblical or religious instruction
in the schools, whether the ordinary teachers who are
responsible to the Board, or the clergy or other persons
specially appointed for that ^purpose by the various reli
gious bodies themselves ? The resolution declares that
the children are to be taught, not theology, but Religion
and Morality. To admit, therefore, independent teachers
of theology, would be, in so far as such theology is in
conflict with religion and morality, to admit teachers of
irreligion and immorality, and would thus neutralise the
Resolution of the Board, and the whole object of educa
tion, which, as cannot be repeated too often at this time,
consists in the development of the intellect and moral
sense.
Probably nothing could be put before the young more
pernicious than the teaching of the official theologian.
It was but the other day that a clergyman of the English
Establishment preached a sermon to the effect that Jacob
was quite right to cheat his father and brother because
he knew that he should make a better use of the property
than they would. No, however sound the theology of such
teaching may be, and this is no rare or extreme instance,
it certainly is not the teaching by which either the
intelligence or the moral sense of children is likely to be
developed.
XV.
So far from the simple and natural explanation which
I have given of the incongruities and contradictions con
tained in the Bible, having been diligently promulgated
by those who have’ undertaken to be its interpreters, our
spiritual teachers have, on the contrary, during some
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three hundred years done their best to erect the Bible
into an jinfallible standard, not merely of theology, but
of religion and morality. Outvying the apostle who, in
the excess of his zeal, cut off one ear, they have done
their best to stop up both ears against the voice of reason
and conscience. They forget that Jesus restored the in
jured organ.
It is true that an excuse for the existence of the popular
theory, and for the tenacity with which it has held its
ground, is not far to seek. It was natural that we should
feel a high degree of gratitude towards the book which
materially aided us in emancipating ourselves from the
yoke of mediaeval Papalism, and asserting our own indi
viduality among the community of the nations. It was
natural that our enthusiasm for the agent of our deliver
ance should lead us to place it high, even too high, in our
regards. And so it came that we replaced an infallible,
but discomfited, Pope by an infallible book; not per
ceiving that, if indeed it was a credit to the Bible to
have made us free, we do the reverse of honour to it by
allowing it to tyrannise over us in turn.
Again, in addition to being a grateful, we are an emi
nently prudent, folk. We prefer to be on with a new *
love before we are quit of the old. Hating anything
like an interregnum, we cry, “ The king is dead. Long
live the king,” without the interval of a moment. And
so we continue to cling to the old accustomed dwelling,
letting it crumble into ruin around us, rather than endure
a brief season of discomfort while waiting for the rear
ing of a new habitation on its site. “ If we give up the
Bible as an infallible guide,” it is asked, “ to what are
we to look in its place 1 ”
Having at present to deal with facts, and not with
fancies, there is no need to enlarge on the popular dogma
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further than to say that, not being contained in the Bible
itself, but being unknown alike to the Fathers of the
primitive Church, to the Reformers of the sixteenth cen
tury, and to the articles and formularies of both the
Romish Church and the English, it must have its basis
in modern innovation rather than in ancient authority.
I ascribe, then, the popular theory respecting the
Bible in some degree to the causes I have named, but
mainly to that instinctive monarchical tendency which
leads the uneducated to distrust their own intelligence
and moral sense, and require some palpable ruler and
guide. “ In their ignorance of the experimental cha
racter of human nature, men will seek infallibility some
where ; in an oracle, a priest, a church, or a book.” This
tendency has been, as a rule, sedulously fostered by
governments and teachers. Once deprived of their
Fetich, and roused from indolent acquiescence in its
supposed commands, they cry out that their gods have
been stolen from them, and fancy that the universe
will collapse, because they are now forced to fulfil their
proper vocation, and use their own faculties.
It was in virtue of this characteristic that the Swiss
theologians of the seventeenth century maintained the
inspiration • of the comparatively recent vowel-points of
the Hebrew text: that the early Christians ascribed a
supernatural origin to the Septuagint; and the Council of
Trent gave an authority superior to that of the original
texts to the Vulgate, which attained such a height of
superstitious respect that, according to Erasmus, some
monks, on seeing it printed in parallel columns between
the Greek and the Hebrew, likened it to Christ crucified
between the two thieves. (Colloquies.) And it was even
seriously proposed by the theological faculty of Mayence,
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^■r,'‘'7?-,?>,''z
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77
in the 15th century, to make a total “ revision and cor
rection of the Hebrew Bible, inasmuch as it differed
from the authorised Latin translation ! ”
Perhaps the most singular fact in connection with the
popular doctrine is, that to doubt its accuracy has come
to be treated as a piece of heinous moral depravity, and
this even by some who ought to know better. When
the eminent author of the “Christian Year” was con
sulted respecting a difficulty in the way of receiving it,
felt by Dr Arnold, then a student, Keble’s advice was
“ work it down 1 Throw yourself wholly into your
parish or your school, and work it down! ” * This
simply meant, “ ignore itas if faith consisted in the
suppression of doubt, and conscientious scruples were
demons to be exorcised.
Later in life, when pressed on the same point by Sir
John Coleridge, who urged the subject on him as one
that he was competent to deal with, adding that it pro
mised shortly to become the great religious question of
the time, Mr Keble, after endeavouring to evade an
swering, replied shortly that “most of the men who had
difficulties on this subject were too wicked to be reasoned
with.”t Such was the answer of one of the most vene
rated of modern Sacerdotalists to a near relative. of the
great Coleridge, who (in the book I have already quoted)
had pronounced the popular doctrine to be “ superstitious
and unscriptural.”
“ Ignore a conscientous scruple, or you are too wicked
to be reasoned with I” Respect a dogma because it is a
dogma, no matter how the reason and the conscience, nay,
the Almighty himself, be outraged thereby! Submit
humbly to authority, no matter how immoral its require* Stanley’s Life of Arnold.
f Coleridge’s Memoirs of Keble.
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ments! Ignore your scruples, and instead of manfully
“facing your doubts” and “beating your music out,” let
your doubt remain, an unresolved discord, to jar ever
more within your soul! To such straits are they driven
who remain in bondage to “ the weak and beggarly ele
ments” of the popular orthodoxy. Surely it is time for
us to say positively that we will not commit the minds
and consciences of our children to teachers who will bring
them up to regard sincerity as a vice, and crush at once
both intellect and moral sense by superstition, popular or
ecclesiastical.
XVI.
But though our immediate teachers in nursery, school
and pulpit, have laboured assiduously to inculcate this
dogma, it may safely be affirmed that, in addition to the
vast range of authorities already named who reject it,
there is not at this day a single scholar, (I do not say
“learned divine,” but scholar of acknowledged critical
ability,) lay or cleric, orthodox or heretic, in Christendom,
who holds it for himself. One and all, they recognise the
existence in the Bible of, at the very least, a largely per
vading. element of human imperfection. It is true that
Dr Hook in his “ Church Dictionary” defines “ Inspira
tion” as being “the extraordinary or supernatural in
fluence of the Spirit of God on the human mind, by
which the prophets and sacred writers were qualified to
receive and set forth divine communications without any
mixture of error,” and asserts upon his own sole autho
rity that in this sense the term occurs in the passage,
“ all scripture (is) given by inspiration of God.” (2 Tim.
iii. 16.) It is true that in this he is followed by Dr
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Wordsworth and other prominent churchmen. But no
critical scholar ventures to affirm that “ Inspiration ” is
identical with, or implies, “ Infallibility.” On the con
trary, their profoundest investigations only serve to de
monstrate the truth of the conclusion patent to common
sense, that humanity is so constructed as to be incapable
of infallibility in the absence of means of verification;
and that the being prompted by a “ holy spirit,” or dis
position, by no means guarantees a man against error,
however wide his spiritual range, or deep his spiritual
insight.
But farther, even if the original text could be regarded
as infallible, there is the. fact that we do not possess that
original text, and that the documents which claim to be
derived from it, have passed through the hands of many
copyists, each more or less accurate, more or less honest.
And were the text certainly perfect as it is certainly most
defective, there are still the difficulties of translation, diffi
culties which are, as every scholar knows, often absolutely
insurmountable. For the language of different nations
varies with their ideas, and their ideas vary with their
institutions, associations, and habits; so that different
languages frequently have no terms whatever in which to
express the ideas contained in other languages. Many
tropical tribes, for instance, have no words to express
such things as ice and snow, because those things are alto
gether unknown to them. A translation, therefore, of
the Bible into their language is, so far as ice and snow
are concerned, impossible. “ In the islands of the South
Seas there were no quadrupeds Until the first navigators
took some pigs there, when the name given by the natives
to the pigs, became the generic term for all four-legged
animals. The horse was the big pig that runs over the
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ground. The cow was the great milky pig. The sheep
the curly pig. We may imagine the feelings with which
the pious translators of the Bible for the islanders found
themselves compelled to use a corresponding designation
for the phrase “Lamb of God.” The Zulus of South
Africa had no idea of God or a future state, and prized
above all things flesh in an advanced stage of decomposi
tion. Wherefore the missionaries in translating the Bible
for them, and rendering the supreme good in their lan
guage, were obliged to identify God and heaven with
rotten meat.
The same lack of corresponding terms exists more or
less between all languages, as is shown by the fact that
words and phrases are often transported whole from one
language into another. Moreover, words used to express
actions, principles, or qualities, in one language, often be
come concreted into persons and things by the genius of
another. And in all languages, or nearly all, the same
word frequently has many different significations. (As
in English the words Jac,
&c., have each half-a-dozen
meanings.) It sometimes happens, therefore, that a trans
lator has to be guided by what he is led by the context
or some other criterion to think the passage is likely to
mean.
Thus, in the passage, “ Whosoever will save his life
shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake
shall find it. For what is a man profited if he shall gain
the whole world, and lose his own soul ? or what shall a
man give in exchange for his soul?” (Matt. xvi. 25, 26.)
—the word rendered soul is precisely the same, article
and all, with the word rendered life.
Again, for the word spirit, which is used by us in nearly
a score of different senses, personal and impersonal, the
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Greek equivalent, pneumo,, generally, if not always, signi
fies the air, breath, or life. In the well-known passage
in John, (iii. 8.) “ The wind bloweth where it listeth, and
thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence
it cometh and whither it goeth; so is every one that is
born of the spirit,”—the word rendered wind, and the
word spirit, are identical, article and all, with each other.
Yet the translators have given to the same word, occur
ring in the same sentence, two entirely different mean
ings. And, as if to justify this, the modern printers of
the. Greek text sometimes give a capital initial to the
word which is translated spirit; thus in a measure, alter
ing the text to suit the authorised version.
Such was the imperfection of the ancient Hebrew for
the purposes of expression in writing, that it was not
until long after the Bible had been written that the dis
tinction between the tenses of past and future was pro
perly developed. It was in their confusion between these
tenses that our translators, in the magnificent ode of
Isaiah beginning, “ Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people,”
produced the absurd and impious phrase, “ She hath re
ceived at the Lord’s hand double for all her sins,” in
stead of the joyous assurance, “ She shall receive . . .
double for all her sufferings.” (xl. 2.) It is easy to im
agine the difficulty attending prophetic expression in a
language which had no distinct future tense !
A very little reflection on the modus operandi of what
theologically is called “ Inspiration,” will at once exhibit
to us the fallacy of the popular notion. It can only con
sist of an impulse or impression on the mind, so strong
as to make the individual receiving it, ascribe it to a
preternatural source. But, however irresistible for him,
the authority and character of the impression must still
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be determined, not by its strength in relation to his
mind, but by its own intrinsic nature. A bad impres
sion cannot proceed from a healthy source; neither does
a strong impression imply accuracy of doctrine. It is
under an irresistible impulse that the maniac mother
flings her child down a well. It is under an impression
so strong as to be for him an inspiration or divine reve
lation that the celibate takes his unnatural vow, the
devotee starves himself into bad health, the Russian
fanatic mutilates his body, and the Revivalist goes into
convulsions of madness. Thus, whatever is claimed to
be a divine revelation, must be referred ultimately to the
test of the Intellect and Moral Sense, as the sole canon
of criticism. Even the common notion that infallibility
may be attested by the power to work miracles, must be
disclaimed in presence of the instances ascribed in
Scripture to magical or diabolical agency.
“ Wherefore, although a man may have an overwhelm
ing sense that something claiming to be God has spoken
to him, it is clear, that unless he has a prior, personal and
infallible knowledge of God,—a knowledge prior, that is,
to his ‘ inspiration,’—he knows not but that it may be
a demon assuming the garb of light, perhaps even one of
those ‘ lying spirits’ who are represented in the Bible as
infesting even heaven itself, or a fantastic creation of his
own excited fancy. It behoves him, therefore, still to
judge the communication in his calmer moments by its
own intrinsic character, and to deliberate upon the actions
to which it impels him.” The wider the range we learn
to assign to Nature and the human faculties, the less be
comes our necessity for seeking a preternatural origin for
our ideas and impulses, and the more honour we pay to
the divine worker and his work.
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The prevalent readiness to distrust our own ability to
.perceive the higher moral facts of the universe, and our
consequent liability to refer all revelation to the con
sciousness of men who lived ages ago, is, no doubt, attri
butable partly to our possession of so many ancient books
which claim our attention, and draw our minds away
from the contemplation of the direct action of the uni
verse upon our own individual consciousness; and partly
to the repressing influence of those sacerdotal interests
which naturally repose upon traditional authority rather
than upon living insight and reason.
The habit is one to be firmly checked if we would
avoid the practical Atheism of banishing G-od and Truth
from the living present to the dead past. “ The creed or
belief of any age is, at best, but the index to the height
■of the divine presence of Truth in that ago.” To adopt
its limitations as our own, is to turn a deaf ear to the
voice of that “ Spirit of Truth” or Truthfulness, of whom
it was said by one who himself drew all his inspiration from
within, that “ when he is come he will guide you into all
truth.” (John xvi. 13.) It is but a limited sway that this
Spirit of Truthfulness has as yet obtained. Wherefore
the effect of all dogmas,—whether formulated in creeds,
■catechisms, or articles of faith,—and their maintenance by
oaths and emoluments, independently of intrinsic pro
bability or any possibility of verification, is to arrest
the natural development of Humanity and to disturb and
retard the whole process of the evolution of the species,
in regard to its highest functions. It is to give the
world a base money-bribe to retain in its maturity the
form, the garb, the dimensions, the ^maturity of its
childhood. Hear a recent utterance of one who, with
whatever drawbacks, seeks still to combine the prophet
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and the poet, and thus, with “ Songs before Sunrise,’^ •
heralds the dawn of better times:
A creed is a rod,
And weapon of night:
But this thing is God,
To be man with thy might,
To grow straight in the strength of thy spirit,
And live out thy life as the light. *
The very word Inspiration, in its primary meaning,
relates to the atmosphere. It is an ancient supposition
that ideas are inhaled with the breath. A man found
himself possessed of an idea or thought which the
moment before he had not. Whence could it have
come, if not in-breathed, or inspired, with the air 1 It
was Pythagoras who conceived the idea that the vital
process of the world is a process of breathing, the
infinite breath or atmosphere of the Universe being the
source of all life. An imaginative Oriental people
readily, in their expressions, personified such supposed
source of life and thought. We matter-of-fact Westerns
go on to make such personification absolute and dog
matic. Pn&uma, the air, becomes a personal spirit, or
assemblage of spirits, and divinely “ inspires ” us: as in
the old days of philosophy in Persia, under the influence
of which, during, or after the Babylonish captivity,
many of the Jewish sacred books evidently were com
posed,—’the breath, or Div, formed a linguistic basis for
a personal Devil,j
Ideas in the air !
Those who know what it is to
* Swinburne, very slightly altered.
t Cons. Donaldson’s “ Christian OrthodoxyArt. “Interme
diate Intelligences.”
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-crouch in the unhealthy confinement of close study, ever,
as the Poet says,
“ With blinded eyesight poring over miserable books,”
till heart and head become heavy and dull; and then to
betake themselves to seaside or mountain, where the
fresh winds of heaven blow freely upon them, inflating
their lungs, aerating their blood, and “sweeping the
cobwebs from their brains,” until the renovated organism
becomes re-charged with creative energy, and ideas
begin anew to spring up in the mind, revealing to it
“ Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything, ”
—such as these can well appreciate the charming old
fancy that peopled the air with ideas, and regarded
every new thought as a separate spirit. It is only under
theologic manipulation that such gentle poetry becomes
steam-hammered into hard dogma, that existence is rob
bed of its charm, and millions of mankind are doomed
to pass through life, and to leave it, without ever having
been allowed to know how good the world really is.
But above and beside the questions of Inspiration, of
Language, of Transcription, and Translation, there is
the question of Interpretation. And, supposing all other
difficulties surmounted, we are here met by an impass
ible barrier. For the proposition is nothing less than
axiomatic, that “ an infallible revelation requires an
infallible interpreter : and that both are useless without
an infallible understanding wherewith to comprehend
the interpretation.”
By such demonstration of the utter impossibility of
infallibility, (in the theologic sense,) the ground is
entirely cut away from beneath, not only all past, but all
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• future superstitions. For, by. annihilating “ authority,
it compels us to refer everything whatsoever to the
criterion of the intellect and moral sense of man. There
is now, therefore, no longer any space for " dogma.”
XVII.
To the list of authorities already given, I propose to
add a few representative names from the various schools
of theologic thought within the Established Church.
The first is that of the Bev. Dr Irons, who, in his
remarkable little volume, “ The Bible and its Inter
preters,” declares that “ any reasonable being who
would accept the Scriptures at all, must take them on
some other ground than that which identifies the written
Word with God’s Eevelation. A more hopeless, carnal,
and, eventually sceptical position, it is impossible to
conceive.” (p. 39.) Dr Irons, in this, follows the learned
Bishop of St David’s, Dr Thirlwall, whose recent noble
protest against the dishonesty of sacerdotal bigotry in
high places, in relation to the work of Biblical revision,
may well raise our respect for him to veneration, as one
who, in spite of his position, has dared practically to
point the distinction between Morality and the prevalent
Theology. In one of his Episcopal charges, Dr Thirlwall
points out the fact that “ Among the numerous passages
of the New Testament in which the phrase The Word
of God,” occurs, there is not one in which it signifies the
Bible, or in which that word could be substituted for it
without manifest absurdity.
It is notorious that the popular imagination is wont
to regard the same phrase, when used in the Psalms, as re
ferring, if not to the whole of the Old and New Testaments,
at least to the books ascribed to Moses and Samuel. .
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The late Dean of Canterbury, Dr. Alford, in his
“New Testament for English readers,” (p. 3.) says,
“Each man reported and each man selected according
to his own personal characteristics of thought and
feeling.”
Yet one other name, that of Bishop Colenso, whose
critical analysis of the Hebrew text is allowed by
scholars to constitute one of the most remarkable monu
ments of patient labour and sober judgment to be
found in literature. These scholars, approaching the
subject from opposite directions, agree in their main
conclusions. Their immediate motives, however, differ
considerably. The object of Dr. Irons is to force us
back, in the search for Infallibility, to rely altogether
upon “the Church.” “Hearthe Church,” is his maxim.
(Matt, xviii. 17.) But which Church ? we must ask,
and ask in vain. What saith the Church of England
in her articles? “As the Churches of Jerusalem,
Antioch, and Alexandria, have erred, so also hath the
Church of Rome erred.” (Art. xix.) Moreover, “General
Councils.............sometimes have erred.” (xxi.) (It was
a general Council that determined what books should
form the canon of Scripture, and what should be
rejected.) Can we wonder if the other Churches rejoin,
as at least one of them has done, with anathemas,
“ So also hath the Church of England erred ?”
The object of Dean Alford was to mediate between
the two extremes of popular orthodoxy and the results
of critical knowledge.
That of Bishop Colenso is simply to find out and state
what is the fact, believing that such purpose alone is
consistent with the deference due to the intellect and
moral sense of man, to truth, and to God Himself. In
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one of his “ Natal Sermons,” he sums up the results of
his labours by describing the Bible as containing the
“Early attempts at History,” the writers of which
record, with «the simplicity of childhood, the first ima
ginings of thoughtful men about the Earth’s formation
and history, and mingle with traditionary lore and
actual fact, the legends and mythical stories of a hoar
antiquity, yet tell us how men were “ moved by the
Holy Ghost,” in those days, how they were “feeling
after God,” and finding Him, how the light shone
clearer and clearer upon their minds, as the day-star
of Eternal truth rose higher and higher upon them. . . .
A human book, in short, though a book full of divine
life.............written, as Paul says, for our learning, but
not all infallibly true.” (i. p. 62, &c.) •
But Dr. Irons and Bishop Colenso, while differing
apparently so widely in their motives, yet have in reality .
the same object. The Bishop would force us back
directly upon the Intellect and the Moral Sense. And
Dr Irons would force us back upon them through the
intermedium of “ the Church,” whatever that may be.
For we need not entertain the uncharitable supposition,
that he would have us substitute the authority of the
Church for that of the Mind and the Conscience.
XVIII.
There is yet another authority to which it is necessary
to refer, inasmuch as it is the highest present expression
of the intellect and moral sense of the country applied
to the regulation of human life in its secular relations.
We have seep that, so far as following Christ and his
precepts are concerned, there are many respects in
�and Modern Education.
89
which both the Church and the world are palpably
anti-Christian. The world rejects communism, celibacy,
and contempt of knowledge; and both Church and
world set at nought the most positive injunctions of
Christ and of the Bible, as in taking medicine and in
praying in Church. The practice of our Courts of
Law is equally in opposition to the. popular doctrine of
an infallible Bible. Yet, with curious confusion, the
popular mind still endeavours to concur with both;
and judges still have the audacity to assert that the law .
of the land is founded on the Bible.
I will give an example or two.
You will remember the passages I quoted (p. 44.) in
reprobation of the medical profession, and of those who,
in illness, “ Seek not to the Lord, but to the physicians.”
Well, we have among us a small sect calling itself after
a Bible-phrase, “ The Peculiar People.” These hold
that prayer is the only allowable resource for Christians
in tijne of sickness. They do not refuse to cure them
selves of hunger by food, of fatigue by rest, or to pick
themselves up when they fall. They have no consistent
theory or uniform practice respecting the relation of
means to ends. But because a verse in one of the
Epistles enjoins the calling in of the elders to pray over
the sick, and declares that “the prayer of faith shall
save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up;” (Jam.
v. 14.) they prefer to die sooner than call in a doctor, or
take any medicine. Had the Apocrypha been thought
fit by our Church to be included in the Canon, this sect
would have had no existence, for the Book of Ecclesiasticus contains several warm commendations of medicine
and medical men : saying, “ Honour the physician. . . .
for the Lord hath created him............... the Lord hath
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created medicines out of the earth; and he that is wise
will not abhor them.” (xxxviii. i. 1-15, &c.)
A short time ago, however, the neighbours of the
people who are so very “ peculiar” as to show their faith
in the New Testament by their works, and to risk their
lives on the strength of a vote in an ecclesiastical council,
(that rejecting the Apocrypha,) were scandalised by
observing that they had allowed a child to die without
taking any human means to save it. An appearance in
the police-court followed, when the leaders of the sect
attempted to justify their conduct by an. appeal to the
Scriptures. But so diametrically opposed is the Spirit of
our Law to that of the Sacred Books upon which our
Law-Established Church is founded, that the magistrate,
though he made allowance for the offenders on the ground
of gross ignorance, flatly refused to receive their plea, and
warned them that on a repetition of the offence, nothing
would save them from being committed for trial on a
charge of manslaughter. And his conduct received the
approbation of a country calling itself Christian!
The other instance is that of the late case of “ Lyon
versus Home.” This was an action for restitution of’
money obtained under false pretences; and of course in
an action of this nature the one thing to be proved is
that the pretences under which the money was obtained,
were false.
The defendant Home is one of a sect of persons who
claim to hold intercourse with the spirits of the dead.
The prosecutor Lyon is, (or was,) a believer in thedoctrines of that sect, and in the defendant Home as one
of its chief apostles. She is, (or was,) also a wealthy
widow; and under the supposed injunctions of her
departed husband, as made known to her through the-
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mediumship of Home, she made over to Home a large
portion of her property, I believe some <£60,000, but
the amount, however material elsewhere, is not material
to our argument.
You will bear in mind that what I am about to relate
occurred in a country whose laws maintain, at an enormous
expense to its people, a Church called Christian, whose
Sacred Books,—which are accepted by the whole nation
officially as divinely inspired, and by the bulk of the
nation individually as infallibly true,—repeatedly and
unmistakeably affirm the leading doctrines of the sect to
which the parties in this case belonged; namely, that
intercourse is possible and frequent between the living
and the spiritual world.
To quote some of the numerous passages involving this
belief, there is the well-known story of the witch of
Endor, in which the spirit of Samuel is represented as
appearing to the witch, and delivering a discourse for the
benefit of king Saul. (1. Sam. xxxvii.) There is the
statement that at the crucifixion of Jesus, many of “ the
Saints which slept arose. . . . and appeared unto many.”
(Matt, xxvii. 52-53.) There is the story of the “Trans
figuration,” in which Moses and Elias, dead for hundreds
of years, appeared to the disciples; (xvii. &c.) the con
version of Paul, in which Jesus himself, sometime dead,
addressed Paul in an audible voice from heaven, (in the
words of a Greek Play ;*) (Acts ix. 4-6.) and the
summoning back of the spirit of Lazarus to his body.
(John xi. 25-43, &c.) There is the parable of the rich
man in torment conversing with the spirit of Abraham
in bliss, begging, with curious confusion between spirit
and matter, that the spirit of Lazarus might be permitted
* The Bacchae of Euripides.
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Jewish Literature
to “ dip the tip of his finger in water ” and cool the rich
man’s tongue : or, in case the alleviation of suffering
were not among the functions of the blessed, that the
spirit of Lazarus might be sent back to earth to convert
the five living brethren of the rich man; which last
request-was refused, not as the first was on the ground of
its impossibility, but as superfluous and useless. (Luke
xvi. 22, &c.). We read, too, of guardian angels, (Matt,
iv. 4.) and “ministering spirits;" (Heb. i. 14.) and of
a whole apparatus of intermediate intelligences existing
between God and man. In the Acts we find certain
pious Pharisees exclaiming of Paul, “ if an angel or
spirit hath spoken to him, let us not fight against God.” ♦
(xxiii. 9.) John tells us to “ believe not every spirit, but
try the spirits whether they be of God.” (1 John iv. 1.)
Job, in thrilling language, describes a spirit as passing
before his face and pausing to speak to him. (iv. 15, &c.)
The practice of necromancy is forbidden in Deuteronomy,
(xviii. 2.) its reality not being called in question; (though
how the Jews reconciled it with their denial of the after
life, does not appear.) The Gospels repeatedly refer to
cases of possession by spirits, without specifying their
nature or origin; and in Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible,
the fact of apparitions of the dead is regarded as being,
for the Bible, past a doubt.
S.uch, on this point, are the tenets of the book which
it is an article of faith with the very people whose law
was invoked in the case of “Lyon versus Home,” im
plicitly to believe. And yet, so far from any proof
being required of the falsity of the defendant’s pretences,
they were at once assumed to be an utter and monstrous
imposition; and the defence was laughed out of court,
in face of the contents of the very book upon which the
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93
witnesses in it had been sworn : the book upon which
our Religion is “ by law established
and for the sake
of inculcating which as infallible, we insist upon vitiating
or crippling our whole system of National Education !
To these illustrations of the growing divorce between
ancient credulity and modem Belief must be added that
of Witchcraft; concerning the belief in which John
Wesley said that “The Bible and Witchcraft must stand
or fall together.” While the anger excited among us by
the devout utterances of the Prussian king over his late
successes, may be ascribed in some degree to the fact
that we are learning to repudiate the old notions which,
recognising success as the test of merit, make Divine
Providence the arbiter in human quarrels ; and in some
degree to the consciousness of having ourselves been
such eminent practisers in the same pietistic line as to
make king William’s conduct look very much as if meant
for a caricature of our own.
Having paid some attention to the recent sittings of
the Church Assemblies in Edinburgh, I have been pleased
to observe symptoms of a growing respect for the authority
of the Intellect and the Conscience in regard to matters of
Eaith, north of the Tweed. I have read that one clergy
man declared his belief that the sacrifice of Christ was
an atonement of sufficient value to counterbalance the
misdeeds of Satan himself, and justify the Almighty in
pardoning the Arch-fiend; and that another “ elder ”
valued the character of the Deity so highly “that his hair
stood on end at the notion that God could ever be re
conciled to the devil.” I take it as a hopeful sign that
these two theologians should thus renounce all claim to
judge such questions by the old dogmatic standards, and
appeal instead to their own moral sense. They have only
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'Jewish Literature
to carry the process somewhat further to perceive that the
God who could create such a being as the devil at dll, or
who could require to be propitiated towards his own off
spring by such a sacrifice as that of Christ at dll, is no
God worthy of being acknowledged or revered by any
being possessed of a spark of intelligence or independence
of spirit.
Lord Chesterfield once wrote to a friend, “Both
Shaftesbury and I have been- dead for several years; but
we don’t wish the fact to be generally known.” In the
same way very much of the Bible has been dead for
some time. It still exists, but is outliving its influence
for evil; and there are many who fancy themselves in
terested in keeping the fact from being generally known.
Yet that it is no chimera which I am encountering,
has just been powerfully illustrated by a discussion in
the House of Lords * in relation to University Tests;
wherein it was declared, both by Lord Houghton and by
the Marquis of Salisbury, that “ the immense majority
of the people of this country adhere to the authority and
teaching of the Bible; their reverence for it being so
absolute that any person who avows hostility to its
doctrines is disabled, not only from holding any office
connected with moral and religious teaching, but almost
from any political office. And that no one can appear at
the hustings with any chance of success, and announce
that he does not accept the Bible.”
XIX.
Sir John Coleridge was right when he said that this
Bible question promised shortly to become the great
* (Debate of May 11th 1871.)
�and Modern Education.
95
religious question of the time. It is so; not for the
reason he then anticipated, hut because the Bible, or
rather the popular theory about the Bible, stops the way
to our advance in all that favours the redemption, or
constitutes the highest good, of a people.
By reason of this one impediment our whole system
of national education “ hangs fire; ” while our systems
of private education are neutralised or vitiated. It is
therefore for those who are under no obligation to refrain
from using their reasoning faculties; those who decline
allegiance to any dispensation which imposes a penalty
for putting forth a hand to .sustain and forward that
which they regard as the Ark of their country’s redemp
tion ; (1 Chron. xiii. 9, &c.) those who believe that it is
only through man working together freely and intelli
gently with man towards the highest moral ends, that
real good is to be done;—it is for these, I say, to grapple
with the difficulty, and if need be, to take the place of
those who have hitherto been our teachers. If we are
no longer to regard the Bible as a Fetich, to be adored,
but not comprehended; if wfe are not to adopt as an
article of Faith the suggestion of the flippant Frenchman,
that the God of the Jewish Scriptures and of our own
advanced intelligence and moral sense, is in reality one
and the self-same Being ;■—that he was once as bad as
the Jews made him out to be, but has improved with
age and experience, (a suggestion I have lately heard
seriously propounded by a clergyman in despair at the diffi
culties he found in the Bible)—then the solution which
has now been proposed must be accepted by us: other
wise the intellect and the conscience must be rejected
altogether as illusory and inventions of the devil; and
some other criterion, and one which discards both
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yewish Literature
intellect and conscience, must be sought for to regulate
our judgment.
For my part, I think better of my countrymen than
to believe that when once the truth is put plainly before
them, they will long halt between the two opinions. I
believe that when once the alternative is shown to them
to lie between gross superstition and a rational religious
ness,—they will no longer endure that their faith be only
definable as believing what they know to be untrue; but will
insist on their children being trained to subject all
things to the test of a cultivated intelligence and moral
sense. Thus trained, they will peruse the Bible, no
longer as slaves, but in a spirit of intelligent appreciation,
sifting out the germs of truth for themselves, and not
scoffing at or rejecting the whole on account of the husks.
From henceforth the teacher in the schools of the
nation must never forget that it is the purpose of his
schoolroom to be the training-ground, not of any party or
sect, but whereon to develop the faculties which later in
life are to determine the nature of individual belief. To
impart a bias, or to anticipate or prevent the formation
of genuine, honest opinion, by the early instilment of
dogma, is at once to stultify every principle of sound
education, inasmuch as it is to repress the intellect and
contravene the moral sense. Whatever the views which
may be adopted in mature age by those who have been
educated under the system I am advocating, there will
be no cause to fear that they will be the' worse for being'
founded in an intelligence and moral sense which have
been thus rigidly trained in youth.
Shall it be said of our solution as was said by one
upon first beholding the sea, “ Is this the mighty ocean, •
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97
is this all ? ”
“ Yes,” we may confidently reply, in
respect to our reliance upon the intellect and the con
science developed by rational education, “ these are all.”
At first, indeed, you see from the margin but a small part
of them. But only trust yourself to them: launch boldly
out upon them: sail where you will with them, and they
will bear you safely through the whole universe of
being.”
At present, for us in England, the issue lies with our
School-boards. If their members are themselves ignorant
of the simple law of human development in religious
ideas, or are unworthily complacent to the ignorance and
superstition of their constituents, generations may pass
before the standard of education and religion is brought
up to the standard of modern thought and knowledge.
Generations may pass and the Bible will still be found
the subject of hopeless contention, and source of fatal
disunion and weakness. And generations long here
after will find the country sunk deeper and deeper in
ignorance and barbarism; while the nations which have
sprung from our race, and speak our language, will have
passed so far ahead of us that they can only look back
upon “ poor England” with pity and contempt as an effete
and imbecile land, “ whose prophets prophesied falsely,
whose priests bore rule by their means, and whose people
loved to have it so.”
TURNBULL AND SPEARS, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.
�
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Jewish literature and modern education, or: the use and misuse of the Bible in the schoolroom, being two lectures delivered before the Sunday Lecture Society, March 26th and April 2d 1871
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Place of publication: Ramsgate
Collation: 97, [1, 3] p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Publisher's list on unnumbered pages at the end.
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Thomas Scott
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1871
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G3435
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Education
Judaism
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Bible
Judaism
Religious Education